Between the Shadow and the Soul
by Courtney Belle
Summary: COMPLETE. Chuck and Blair. Together, they ruled the Upper East Side. Bass and Waldorf. One lives in exile, the other mourns the life they used to have. What changed? Elle Waldorf wants to know.
1. La Petite Princesse

**CHAPTER ONE**_  
La Petite Princesse_

I was six years old the first time ma mère allowed me to go into papère's private library without supervision. I remember tugging nervously on the white ribbons in my hair and staring at the double doors in apprehension for several minutes, before my nanny prodded me in the back and told me I had better get a move on before bedtime. So, pretending quite fervently that I was Lucy Pevensie about to stumble upon Narnia in an unassuming wardrobe, I tiptoed reverently toward the Brazilian rosewood doors and slowly turned their handles.

After savoring the moment, which even to my young mind seemed significant, I peered into the forbidden room. Then, after emitting a rather undignified squeal of delight, I tore towards the nearest bookshelf and began pulling down its contents with the reckless abandon any other child might display in a candy store.

I spent hours searching the shelves, stretching my reading muscles as I tried (and failed) to comprehend the first pages of _Les Misérables_, and beaming with delight when I found a first edition printing of my favorite story - _Le Petit Prince_. I felt very grown up then, reading to myself in the window seat.

As I knew she would, mère came in to check on me after I had settled in. When she saw the title of the book cradled in my hands, she smiled and sat down next to me to see how far I had gotten on my own. I read to her, holding myself upright and pretending like she was the child_ I_ was tucking into bed. I did that sometimes with my dolls, when I was young enough to believe they could understand what I was saying to them. In a lot of ways, ma mère was my favorite doll, and not just because she _could_ understand me. Sometimes, if I had been very good that day, she would let me stand on the chair at her vanity and brush her long chocolate-brown curls 100 times before she tied a silk ribbon around them and nudged me away. Watching her do her makeup for parties was a bigger treat than our maid's post-dinner desserts, and most of the time she would let me sit beside her so I could observe the careful upward strokes of her mascara wand, the graceful precision with which she applied shockingly red color to her down-turned lips.

Her lips were always sad, even when they were rich with crimson lipstick and soft like my pillow when she kissed me goodnight.

I could count, at age six, the number of times I had seen her smile with true happiness.

That night, sitting in the window of papère's library, was one of those times.

"Les hommes ont oublié cette vérité, dit le renard. Mais tu ne dois pas l'oublier. Tu deviens responsible pour toujours de ce que tu as apprivoisé."

Ma mère ceased stroking my hair and let her hand rest on my shoulder. I stopped reading and looked up from the pale yellow pages to see her pale pink lips smiling down at me, and I knew it was genuine because it lit something in the back of her eyes – the same eyes I saw when I looked AT myself in the bathroom mirror. I liked to imagine that someday, I would be as pretty as ma mère and _that_ would make her smile all the time.

"Lis-le de nouveau, chérie, en anglais."

I would be seven before I had any real grasp of the English language. I look back now at those hours spent poring over books, as I tried so desperately to make ma mère proud of my mastery over her native tongue, and I remember how difficult it was to wrap my mouth around the choppy phrases that sounded so crude and inelegant to my ears. And all that time, I only saw those horrible words as a means to an end. I learned them for her, because I wanted to understand her like she understood me when she let me brush her hair.

"_Les hommes_..." I wracked my brain nervously for the translation, and I felt – but did not see – my mother's eyebrows knit together. She was so incredibly smart, and I could not remember a simple three-letter word. In my defense, the plurals in French are so very different from the plurals in English. That lesson took me the longest to learn. "The mens – "

"Men, no _the_." She was prompt in her correction, as she was prompt in everything else.

"Men," I mumbled apologetically, "have forgotten...the – this true...truth. Say -- said le fox."

"_The _fox." She mercifully dropped a kiss into the thickest part of my hair, and saved me from butchering the sentence any more. "But you must not forget it. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed."

We spent that afternoon together amid the stacks, alternating reading duties and smiling at each other whenever I managed to successfully translate and understand any sentence longer than seven words. I loved her attention and hoarded it like I might hoard my expensive ribbons, or the hand-made satin dresses that adorned my precious collection of porcelain dolls. I knew that she loved me, and I knew that I loved her, but I also understood that she kept some of her love away, hidden somewhere inside of her. In the instances when she shared even a little bit of her stored affection with me, it was like she shared the secret kiss tucked in the corner of her mocking mouth. I was Wendy and she was Mrs. Darling, and she was giving me hope that I would never _really_ have to grow up.

She left me when the sun sunk so low that the library was cast in golden squares of light. When the door clicked shut behind her, I closed _Le Petit Prince_ and hugged it to my chest as I went searching for a new hidden treasure.

I found it tucked away in a dark corner, behind an old diary that once belonged to papère. It was the diary that first caught my interest, because it was hand-bound, likely by grand-père (papère's arts-and-craftsy husband), and contained an amalgam of papers from various periods of time. The dates at the tops of several pages shocked me – would I _ever_ be old enough to say that things were 'different' when I was young?

A name appeared a few times, a name that I never spoke aloud, but which I knew as well as my name, or my nanny's, or my bunny's.

_Blair._

That was what papère and grand-père called her. I simply knew her as ma mère and, when I was feeling particularly childish, maman.

The treasure behind that diary was another diary, this one much newer, but much more worn. It was, unlike the collection of gathered materials my papère called a diary, a _genuine diary._ Crafted for the sole reason that girls everywhere loved to fill pretty pages with thoughts they could not speak aloud. I reached for it with wide eyes, unable to stop myself from pulling it off the shelf. I allowed myself a moment to feel the soft Italian leather beneath my fingertips.

When I opened it in the middle and let a folded photograph fall from between its pages, I sucked in a breath and felt, for the second time that day, that I was about to experience a significant moment. I set the new diary down and ran my fingers over its surface yet again. Written on those hand-stitched pages were my mother's secrets. I could deduce that much from the fact that the beautiful book was hidden so carefully in the most secluded section of papère's chateau – not only IN the forbidden library, but on a high shelf in a corner _behind_ another book in the forbidden library. Had sheer luck led me to it? Was I supposed to read it? I desperately wanted to, so I settled myself down to examine its contents.

Some familiar letters sprawled in front of my eager eyes, but they were arranged in unfamiliar ways.

There were rocks in the bottom of my stomach when I realized my mother had written the diary in English.

My gaze left the thick cream-colored pages and found the folded-up photograph sitting peacefully beside my pale knees. Words were relative to me then, because there was no way I could translate my mother's English writing without her help...and I was not so young that I thought showing her the diary would not get it snatched away. The photograph however – the photograph was in a universal language. My eyes could interpret it without any help from a stern tutor or a thick language dictionary.

I carefully unfolded it two times, letting it unfurl like a flower in bloom.

It wasn't a slick, glossy picture like the ones papère printed of me astride a horse, of me learning to swim, of me smiling on my first day of school. This photograph was a bit sturdier than that, and its colors were fading like an old memory. It reminded me of a stormy day at dawn. The smell was what made me lean closer, because it smelled like ma mère when she sprayed her perfume on her wrists before a party.

And it was ma mère that I saw smiling up at me (that meant I had finally seen her really smile _six_ times – far too many to count on one hand anymore), but she was very young, and there was a man holding her in his arms. A red headband kept her familiar brown curls out of her face, and she was looking at the camera with so much happiness in her eyes that I felt my own lips curve upwards to match hers.

My desire to know who the man in the picture was, and what he had done to make my mother smile so, was the inspiration I needed to form those crude English words. I learned them for her, because I wanted to understand her like she understood me when she let me brush her hair. I wanted to know how to make her happy _all the time_, like the man in the picture seemed to do. He pressed his lips to the side of her head, and held her close to him with his hand gripping her shoulder, and she was so happy. I had to know how to do that too.

The diary had the answers; I just had to unlock them.

* * *

**  
A/N:** I'm writing this to kick-start myself into finishing some of my other stories. =] It sort of unfolded as a mystery in my head, and since those were my favorite stories when I was little...it only seems natural to try my hand at one now.

Some clarifications:  
If you haven't gleaned it from the chapter _papère _is Harold and _grand-père_ is Roman – both are French for grandfather. _Mère_ means mother, and _ma mère_ means my mother; _maman_ is closer to mom or mama. "Lis-le de nouveau, chérie, en anglais" can be translated as "Read it again, darling, in English". There will be a fair amount of French in the story, as it is the main character's first language, but it will rarely be more complicated than _mère _and _papère_, and if it IS, I will do my best to provide an in-text way for you to understand it without putting the translation in parenthesis.

Drop me a line if you have any further questions, and leave a review if you ARE interested in reading more! Merci beaucoup.

**Disclaimer:** Gossip Girl and its characters are _not mine_, nor do I claim they are mine, nor do I think they are mine, nor do I want anyone to think that I think they are mine. Anything you recognize from the show is from the show, and anything you don't recognize from the show is from my own head. The quote from _The Little Prince_ is likewise not mine, and neither are Lucy Pevensie, Wendy Darling, or Mrs. Darling. The title of the story comes from the Pablo Neruda poem _XVII_; the full line is _'in secret, between the shadow and the soul'_, and it seemed to fit this piece. ...Was that thorough enough? I certainly hope so. ;]


	2. Through the Looking Glass, and What Elle

**A/N:** Thank you, everyone, for your reviews and encouragement! To Hannah: the name (or, at least, her nickname) is revealed in this chapter, but I'll just tell you that she is named for Eleanor and someone else...the someone else will be revealed later! VerybadForU: My French is pretty meager, so I'm glad to see I only made a few mistakes. Incidentally, if there is anyone reading this who knows French and could perhaps 'French-beta' me, that would be wonderful. Thank you!

Here is part two, wherein we slowly move forward. :] The chapter title is adapted from Lewis Carroll's novel _Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There_, and his quote in the chapter is taken from _Alice's Adventures in Wonderland._

**CHAPTER TWO**_  
Through the Looking-Glass, and What Elle Found There_

My favorite place to read was always beneath the covers. In my bed, surrounded by luxurious silk and feather down, I could comfortably lie on my stomach and read late into the night. My nanny, Dorota, was forever wondering how I used so many flashlight batteries when she hardly ever saw me with my flashlight. Ma mère always smirked secretively over Dorota's rounded shoulders, because she would sometimes join me in my cave of wonders in the wee hours of the morning, usually clad in an expensive gown and priceless jewels.

The first time I ever refused her entry was after my seventh birthday. I had finally outgrown my English tutor, and could quote full passages of _Le Petit Prince_ in both my first and second languages. _"Men have forgotten this truth, said the fox. But you must not forget it. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed."_ That was my favorite one to recite, particularly to Dorota as she braided my hair.

"You know what this means now, Miss Elle?"

I nodded ecstatically because I _did_. I felt like I could conquer the world with my newfound understanding.

But, more importantly, I could conquer mère's English diary.

Since that first day in papère's library, I had kept the diary well-hidden in the secret compartment at the back of my closet. Grand-père had opened it for me when I was four, and told me that I could hide all my dearest treasures inside of it. The diary, and the photograph of my mother and the dark-haired man, had joined my first ballet slippers, a box full of pretty pebbles I had found by the lake, and my mother's golden ruby ring.

One night, soon after my English tutor had been dismissed and papère had bought me my very own English editions of both _The Little Prince_ and _Alice's Adventures in Wonderland_ (which was quickly becoming my second favorite story), I smuggled the diary out of the compartment and retreated beneath the covers with my flashlight.

I stared nervously at the book for a long time, wondering how best to begin. I had been waiting to understand my mother's secrets for over a year, and my heart was fluttering from more than just excitement. What if I didn't like the secrets I found? What if the diary didn't tell me _anything_ about the handsome man in the photograph? Should I start from the middle and hope the information was there? I knew I couldn't read ahead, because that was a cardinal sin as far as I was concerned. Where would I start?

"Begin at the beginning and go on till you come to the end; then stop."

Taking Lewis Carroll's advice, I opened the book not in the middle where the photograph first fell from, but at the very beginning. 2011.

_I have had exactly four diaries in my life, and none of them have lasted longer than a few scattered entries about parties, friends, and clothes. There was that awful diary that my psychiatrist made me keep after my episodes in high school, but that was a __long__ time ago and this is __not__ going to be that kind of diary, do you understand? If this diary even lasts until the end of this month, that is. I'm notorious for not caring about documenting my every thought inside a book that __anyone__ could read, should they happen to pick it up one day and ignore the threatening message I wrote on the page before this._

I flipped the page back and tried to find a threatening message, but all that remained of it was what hadn't survived when it was ripped out.

_I don't know what good this is going to do, but everyone seems to think I need some kind of __help__ right now. Is it such a crazy idea to think that maybe they might want to...oh, I don't know...help me themselves? Instead they shove me this empty book and tell me to write down my feelings so I can sort them through. I know how to sort through my feelings, thanks; I've been doing it for years. I don't need a finely crafted, obviously very expensive Italian leather journal to reveal any secrets I don't know about myself. I know perfectly well who I am._

_I'm Blair Cornelia Waldorf. I'm almost 21, almost able to drink legally even though I've done it illegally since I was 13. I have impeccable fashion sense, a bulldog named Handsome (Dan), a maid named Dorota, a best friend named Serena, and an absentee mother who married a nosy Jewish stepfather. I was born in Manhattan and I'll probably die in Manhattan. I will be wearing very expensive shoes when I go. I might live in France with daddy and Roman (the gay man daddy left my mom for when I was a sophomore in high school), or I might go to Tuscany – __ALONE__ – to see its sights and maybe get really drunk on vino in a romantic villa on a lonely hilltop. I like old Hollywood because it was glamorous, I love black and white movies because if life were a black and white movie the lighting would be much more flattering, and I love shoes. And diamonds. And clothes. And Audrey Hepburn._

_I hate poly-blend, trashy celebrity wannabes, secrets, and most of all:_

Before I could read what the 20-year-old version of ma mère hated most of all, I felt her slide under the covers beside me. I slammed the book shut and leapt onto it as best I could, and barely managed to conceal it under my stomach. The diary was almost as wide as I was.

"Bonjour, Ellie."

She was wearing one of her beautiful dresses. I had watched her get ready for a party earlier that night, and because I was seven, she had let me try on some of her lipstick. I had thought it would make me look grown up, like her, but it had only succeeded in accentuating the differences between us. Everything about her face was soft sloping curves, from the fine arch of her eyebrows to the smooth roundness of her cheeks and beautiful jaw. Even at seven, my angles were sharper, narrower, and my full lips which mimicked hers so well were_ not_ hers. Our eyebrows were _almost_ the same, but it was as if someone had blurred the image and put another one on top of it. Where did I get my jaw? Where did I get my lips? Where did I get my cheeks?

I was lying on the answer.

"Hello, maman."

She smiled and kissed the side of my head. I remembered the picture, tucked safely away in my compartment. The handsome man had been kissing the side of her head, clinging to her possessively and squeezing her tightly. Had she learned it from him?

"What are we reading tonight? _The Little Prince_ again? Or is it _Alice_?"

I tried not to gulp. I knew, even without having just read it in her diary, that mère hated secrets. To her, they were a betrayal of trust and I did not want her to think that she couldn't trust me. At the same time, the moment she saw me clutching her very secret diary, it would be snatched away from me and I would lose the key to her happiness forever.

"Je ne suis pas en train de lire," I answered immediately, clicking the flashlight off so she was less likely to catch sight of the book. "I am not...reading. I am writing in my secret diary, can you come back tomorrow, s'il vous plait?"

That was the first time I had not invited her in with open arms.

There was an odd silence then, and I felt it more than I heard it. Something shifted between us beneath those silk covers, and ma mère withdrew without another word. I didn't know it at the time, but I had shut her out of my fantasy hideaway forever. She didn't come back the next night, or the night after that, or any night for the rest of my childhood.

When I heard my heavy bedroom doors close, I poked my head out to make sure she had really gone. When I didn't see her looking at me from the other side of the room, I ignored the sadness in my chest by pulling the book up to me, and flicking the light on in full view of my porcelain doll collection (which was starting to seem a little unnecessary as I had real friends to host tea parties for).

_Chuck Bass._

_He is without a doubt the most heartless son-of-a-Bass evil Basshole Basstard mother Chucking SPAWN OF SATAN hell ever spat forth. I do not hesitate to say that I would __love__ – no, not love, because that word should stay away from him at all costs lest it DIE a horrible screaming tortured death – I would REVEL in seeing him go __back__ to hell and burn there for eternity. After the devil cut his stupid penis off and dangled it in front of him tauntingly before throwing it into the lake of fire or whatever awful thing you throw things into in hell. Then it would grow back and the devil would cut it off AGAIN, lather, rinse, repeat._

_In fact, can __I__ be the devil? I can't imagine how the gig could be that bad if I could do that __all day__ and watch the agony on his face __every single time__. In fact, it would never get old. I would never even get a minion to do it for me. I would do it every time, laugh in his face, maybe kick him or step on his feet. Or mess up his bow tie. Then BAM THE PENIS GOES IN THE LAKE OF FIRE._

At that, I snapped the diary shut and decided maybe its subject matter was a bit too mature for my eyes, just then.

I went back to the closet compartment and sat amidst my shiny shoes and pretty dresses as I exchanged the leather journal for the folded picture. I saw the image I had seen a thousand times, because it was all I could really understand about the diary up until very recently. Ma mère, more radiant than I had ever seen her, in the arms of a dark handsome man. Sometimes I imagined that he would show up on our doorstep and I would find out who he was that way, and _some_times I even dared to pretend that his jaw and my jaw were the same.

I turned it over to the back, like I had done every day since I had found it in papère's library, and I saw the same writing that signed off on my school assignments, that spelled out letters to friends in the States, that excused me from class when I was feeling ill, that was looped elegantly all throughout the diary.

_Chuck and Blair, at the movies! (We held hands too.)  
2010._

"Chuck."

I turned the photograph back to the front, and touched his face lightly. His name was Chuck Bass, and my mother hated him.

I closed the compartment door and went back to my bed, cradling the picture as I crawled beneath the silk sheets and pulled them up to my neck. The picture was my lullaby that night; the image of my mother's vibrant smile and Chuck's tight embrace were the gentle lyrics that soothed me to sleep.

I dreamed that night, so vividly that I can remember its details to this day. I stood, in the dream, on a crowded corner in a strange city. It was not Paris, the buildings were so shiny and the street beneath my shoes was paved differently. The crowd was dense and black, and I began to feel suffocated by the constant shuffling and movement. Just when I was about to scream for ma mère or Dorota to come and get me, a strong hand clenched my shoulder protectively, and I felt a warm body encompass mine as the arm settled over my shoulders. I was led away from the crowd and into a large green park, where children were running and flying kites as adults played music and pushed each other on swing sets.

I looked up, because I could still feel the warm, possessive arm around my shoulders, and I wanted to tell this stranger a hearty 'Merci beaucoup!' for helping me out of that horrible street.

The sharply defined face above me was the same face in the fading photograph, only it was looking down at me with affection. He opened his mouth to speak as I gasped, and then my eyes opened and I was back in my silk and feather down, and the sun was rising outside my East-facing windows.

I stared at my baby blue ceiling as I waited for my heart to stop thundering in my chest. When I had calmed down and the last vestiges of the dream were slowly clicking into place, I reached for the photograph where I had stuck it under my thick foamy pillow, and stared once more at the faces of ma mère and the handsome man holding her.

His name was Chuck Bass, and Blair Waldorf hated him. Why, then, did they looked so deliriously happy?


	3. Little Tiny, or Thumb Elle ina

**A/N:** A HUGE thank you to everyone who has read and reviewed this story, your words to me are the reasons I have the following 3,293 words for you!

(Some clarifications for later:  
Grandmamma – Eleanor  
Saba – Cyrus)

**CHAPTER THREE**_  
Little Tiny, or ThumbElleina_

I forgot about ma mère's diary after that night. I kept the picture tucked safely away in the only hiding place I knew Dorota would not find – my pockets. The picture stayed with me every moment from that day on, and I took great care to keep it folded just so, so that it wouldn't fade anymore. I never opened it outside, just in case the elements withered it any faster. I found myself wondering, when I did unfurl it and let myself stare at the mysterious couple in front of me, why the photograph had faded so fast. It was only twelve years old; it should have looked fairly new. But the colors had faded even more since my sixth birthday, and I could barely make out the sky in the background or tell the difference between ma mère's coat and the arm Chuck had wrapped around her.

The diary had been packed away with several of my personal possessions when mère moved us from papère's chateau to a maison chic in Marnes-la-Coquette, a commune in the western suburbs of Paris. I loved our house there, and the cobbled streets, and the peace and quiet; I also loved that the heart of Paris was only 13 kilometers away. Mère enrolled me at a demanding private school, and I happily donned my perfectly pressed clothes every morning and pushed my hair out of my face with expensive headbands. My hair would never quite hold a curl, however, which was Dorota's eternal disappointment at the time, but I had enough problems on my plate then. I had to be an exemplary student to live up to ma mère's high standards, and I had to excell in my personal drama classes if I wanted to attend the Conservatoire National Supérieur d'Art Dramatique.

Mère tried to convince me for a few months that her alma mater, Yale University in the States, had an excellent theatre program, but I had my heart set on the CNSAD. She smiled at my determination, her full red lips quirking in a fond way, as she seemed to recall some old memory. Then she told me that she understood and adjusted my headband before sending me on my way.

I was eleven, and still I hadn't been able to figure ma mère out. Sometimes I thought I understood her, as the aloof but loving woman who did her makeup every morning and never left la maison without checking every mirror twice for imperfections. But sometimes she could be almost as goofy as I was, and that baffled me. In a way, this mystery overshadowed the enigma of the diary for quite some time. English fell out of fashion in our household, and even Dorota muttered things in clumsy, heavily accented French for my benefit.

When I came across the soft leather book one day in April, it was by sheer accident. I was doing a school project for my drama class, and the assignment led me to our attic, where most of my mementos from Chateau Waldorf were stored. After an exhaustive search, I found the box labeled **Mon compartiment secret - ne pas ouvrir!** Inside were my first ballet slippers (I held them up to my feet and could not believe I had ever been quite that small), the box full of pretty stones that were altogether quite useless, and the diary. My mother's ruby ring was safely dangling from a thin gold chain around my neck.

The shoes had been my intended holy grail, but the book called to me just as it had five years before, and I opened it without a second glance at the beaten and dusty pink slippers.

I skipped the first page that had scared me away when I was seven, and skimmed through several entries until I found one of interest.

_I told you my writing in this thing would be infrequent at best. But at least I'm still keeping it updated on the important stuff – like today, for example. My sonogram today revealed some interesting information, which might be seen as a blessing to some, like Serena the ever optimistic, and as hell on earth for others, like me (i.e. sane, intelligent people who haven't been swept up in the mass hysteria known as baby mania. I am one of these people, and so is Chuck. I never thought I would classify him in the same prestigious category as me, but there are some cases in which subcategories are just not acceptable)._

I tilted my head to the side in thought as I processed the page in my hands. The contents of that page were fascinating, but did not seem useful for my drama assignment – which was to 'find my origins' and explain how they applied to my intended pursuit of theatre. It was about me, in a way, considering my mother had written this diary entry when she was pregnant with me; but what did my mother not catching 'baby mania' have to do with me or my passions?

Seeing Chuck's name was what really intrigued me, and it kept me from thinking solely of my homework. The last time mère had mentioned his name within the pages of her diary had been to...violently suggest several methods of horrible torture, and now she had lumped him in a category with herself. One thing that never changed about ma mère was her unwavering sense that she was elite, and that only people who deserved to be seen with her could ever hope to _dream _of being seen with her.

Spurred on by this new development, and relieved that there were no new threats against Chuck's life, I turned the page and continued.

_On that note, I am really getting exhausted. People keep coming up to me and touching my stomach, which is incredibly rude and invasive, and then they want to know how I'm doing, how I feel, how the baby is, do I know what gender and if I do what names have I considered because they have a great aunt Gertrude who loves babies and would adore to have one named after her. First of all – GERTRUDE WALDORF? I don't think so. There's a certain disease called stupidity, and unfortunately it seems to follow pregnant women around like a cloud and infect people wherever they go._

_Then there's my mother, pestering me to know who the father is. I've just been telling her that I don't know, which is true._

The horrible name Gertrude Waldorf flew out of my head so fast I hardly remembered I had read it.

I wondered if perhaps this too was beyond my maturity level, and seriously contemplated tucking the book back in its box and taking the slippers downstairs...or taking the diary and the slippers and hiding the diary so I could read it later if I was so inclined, or forgetting about the diary and living my happy life with maman and Dorota and never thinking about Chuck Bass and his handsome jaw and his possessive embrace ever again...

At eleven, I often got winded from thinking too much.

Footsteps on the attic steps forced me to shove the delicate journal into my coat and pick up the slippers in a compulsive attempt to look innocent. Ma mère appeared at the top of the steps, her hair coiffed perfectly just below her shoulders, a look of distaste on her porcelain face (which still called forward memories of my old dolls, all of whom were sitting still in my old bedroom at papère's) as she waved a thick puff of dust out of her eyes. She hated the attic.

"Elle...?"

I stood from where I was kneeling beside the private box, and rushed over to her before she could venture any further into the attic.

"Bon soir, mère."

Without sparing another word on that dusty old room, I slipped past her and down the stairs to my bedroom hallway below. She had no choice but to follow me to my playroom, where I had spent the greater part of that cloudy afternoon gluing intricate letters to a large sheaf of poster board. **Pourquoi je serai** **célèbre** it read, proclaiming the reasons why someday, I would headline the great stages of Europe. I still have that poster tucked away somewhere, and every now and then I trip over it by accident – much like I tripped over the diary in the attic, and how I found it hidden in papère's private library in the first place.

The assignment seemed silly now, because even to me the revelation that ma mère might not know the identity of my father was heartbreaking. She had never once, not once in my long magical childhood, told me anything about the man who was partially responsible for my existence. Was he tall or short? Big and strong? Willowy and cold like grandmamma? Short and warm and full of treats and stories like saba?

No. He was probably nothing like papère or grand-père or grandmamma or saba. He was like a grandparent I had never met, another person on my family tree whose name I could not fill in. It was his jaw I had, and a feminine version of his brow because mine had become nothing like maman's. I was sharper, more clearly defined and yet at the same time, as blurry as ever. The eyes I had thought I shared with her were too dark, too cloudy, too confused. And my smile had become paper-thin.

"_I needed these for my project_," I explained en français, holding up my first ballet slippers by their tattered ribbons.

Ma mère sat down in the rocking chair by the window. As the story went, that rocking chair had belonged in her nursery when she had been a little girl, and someday it would go in my little girl's nursery, and so on and on and on until there weren't any Waldorf girls' nurseries to put it in. I remember being eight-and-a-half the first and only time I commented on that story to ma mère; we still lived in the chateau then, and she had just finished brushing my hair and telling me the story of the pretty antique chair we were sitting in.

"Mais, maman..." She had looked at me in that quiet, stern way of hers, because English had been the official language of the Waldorf women then. I hurried to correct myself, stumbling over the words as they tumbled from my mouth. "But, mama. I am not a Waldorf, en vérité, am I? I am really another name that I do not know, non?"

I was discouraged from making up 'silly stories' after that.

'But,' I thought, 'if one thing is forbidden to me, shouldn't it be forbidden to mère as well?'

Her secrets had started to take their toll on my childlike mind. Having no father seemed less romantic by the year, and his absence became more and more painful as I struggled to find him on my own. But I was only eleven years old, how much was I really expected to do by myself? Did I not, as his child (whoever he was), deserve to at least know his name? I wanted nothing more than to see a picture of him, whether he was Chuck or some man I had never heard of and would likely never meet – but I at least wanted to see him. I wanted to know that one day, a long time ago, he and ma mère had been madly in love like the characters in my favorite stories... had they found each other through magic and chance as the prince and Cinderella had? Or had he saved her from a wicked evil as the handsome prince had saved Snow White?

Had they even been in love at all?

I toiled away at my homework for an hour more, glancing up at ma mère in the Waldorf rocking chair when I knew she wasn't watching me. She told me _'silly stories'_ all the time when I was too young to know that they were either; stories that she had planted a barleycorn by the windowsill and out I had sprung from a beautiful tulip. I later learned this had been her sensitive way of telling me I had been born so small that I almost did not make it out of the delivery room. That was the way ma mère relayed information in those days – in messages too beautiful for me to decode, dressed up in fairy tales so that I would not ask too many questions.

But I was tired of not knowing things about myself. The diary was heavy in my coat pocket, and I contemplated faking sick so I could retreat to the seclusion of my bedroom and barricade myself inside. I did not like having to resort to lying and hiding; but mère refused to even entertain the idea of telling me anything about my father, so I resorted to the necessary means and accepted the leather-bound journal as my only option.

But still...what I really wanted was to hear the story from her lips, with the wisdom of years and time cooling whatever hot emotions she had poured into her diary. I wanted to know who I was, and half of that belonged to a man she could hardly bear to think of. I had never seen a picture of him anywhere, not a single photograph in my entire eleven years of existence. Or, at least, I was not sure that I had seen a picture of him. The precious photo of my mother as she had looked in 2010was, at that moment, stowed underneath my feathery bed pillows. My wish to show it to her and beg for answers was overridden by my knowledge that she would snatch it away the moment she saw it. That picture had been my constant companion for five years, and I was not about to willingly give it up. Not then, at least.

"Mère?" I placed the last baby picture of myself on the poster board, and then stepped away so the glue could dry. At least now that I was finished with my drama assignment, I had a legitimate excuse to retreat to my bedroom. "Je veux lire mon livre nouveau. Je pense j'irai à ma chambre."

Ma mère turned her head to examine me, and her curls fell over her shoulder in a graceful way my hair could never mimic. I knew she was examining me because I could feel the cool appraisal in her eyes. I looked down at my shiny black shoes to make sure they were free of scuffs, and subconsciously straightened the petite Jennifer Behr satin headband behind my ears.

"You're still wearing your coat."

I puckered my lips together in thought and hugged the breezy jacket close around my shoulders. If she so much as saw the outline of her journal behind the flimsy springtime cloth, I would never make it out of the playroom without surrendering it. An ominous fear clutched my heart with the same white-knuckled nervousness that led me to hold le journal de ma mère so close to my pounding heart. I could feel it beating against the Italian leather.

"Oui, il fait froid." I offered her a smile, but she did not return it.

Instead, mère stood and slowly crossed from the rocking chair to my work table. She frowned and ran a smoothing hand over the crown of my head, effortlessly tidying any flyaways or stray kinks the day had weaved through my hair. I bit down on my bottom lip as she brushed her fingertips across my clammy forehead, and by the time she was satisfied I did not have a fever, I could swear I felt trickles of blood dripping down my chin. (That, however, was just my overly active imagination kicking into high gear. Had she continued her motherly medical inspection, I likely would have imagined her wearing a stethoscope and a sparkly tiara and bemoaning the state of my black, wicked heart.)

"Oui...it _is_ cold today. Let's get you into bed."

I was eleven years old. Une jeune dame, according to my mother, and a young lady according to Dorota's tearful mutterings at my vanity. I knew very well that, as a young lady of eleven who no longer required daily tea parties or ceramic dolls to keep me happy, I had grown past being tucked in to the sound of a stale, semi-memorized bedtime story. But something about the fact that I was snooping through mère's past behind her back made me long for my _own_ past – the one where I blindly believed I _had_ been hatched from a fairy's barleycorn and bloomed into the world from the inside of a tulip.

I insisted on changing in my large walk-in closet, more because I was able to stow the diary beneath one of my shoe racks than because I wanted to escape ma mère's attention. I liked having her all to myself for once. In those days, most of her evenings were still spent out on the town...the only difference being that _then_ she attended parties with various handsome men, any of whom could have come right off the pages of my fairy tales. Blond, tall, handsome, strong, and kind. Or, at least, kind until they found out about me.

I pulled a silky set of pajamas over my head and felt suddenly guilty for a whole new offense. If I scared away so many perfect Prince Charmings as an almost-teenager, how did I know that infant-me wasn't the reason my father was so...non-existent?

Ma mère pulled the heavy covers down as I emerged from my closet, but I did not really see her as my head buzzed with five years worth of unsolved mysteries. Mechanically, I slid onto my full-sized bed (I would get a queen when I turned thirteen, mère had promised) and situated myself in the very middle of it, allowing mère to perch elegantly on the edge of the mattress as she tucked the sheets around my waist and leaned in to press a kiss to my forehead.

"Maman?" I whispered, reaching for her hand when she stood to leave.

A vague smile turned up the right corner of her mouth, where I had always fancied she kept her secret kiss. I never called her _maman_ anymore. "Oui, bébé?"

The question died on the tip of my tongue, because I could not ask her _'Who is my father?' _when her diary plainly stated that she did not know. If I could not know him, or his name, or his reasons for being so very absent from her life, then I had to know the identity of someone else. Someone who waited in the back of my mind for dreams to stir him; sometimes he arrived to save me from the crowded street corner and take me to the park, other times we walked to a stable or he taught me how to fasten a bow tie around my neck. I knew his name, and I knew that once upon a time mère had gone to the movies with him. Her words about him had been so harsh and angry and...well, foul, that I should have assumed her hatred was steadfast.

But something inside me doubted it. What I really wanted was to hear the story from her lips, with the wisdom of years and time cooling whatever hot emotions she had poured into her diary. My right hand moved to curl around the photograph that lay folded beneath my head.

"Who is Chuck Bass?"

The vague smile melted from her ruby red lips.

**Translations:  
**_Mon compartiment secret - ne pas ouvrir!_** - **My secret compartment - do not open!  
_Pourquoi je serai célèbre_ - Why I will be famous  
_Je veux lire mon livre nouveau. __Je pense j'irai à ma chambre._ - I want to read my new book. I think I will go to my room.  
_Oui, il fait froid. - _Yes, it is cold.


	4. Cinder Elle a

**A/N:** The quotes from books mentioned in this chapter and the preceding ones (The Little Prince, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Cinderella, and whatever else I'm forgetting to mention...) did not come from my brain -- obviously they came from Lewis Carroll and Charles Perrault and Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, etc... I'm not stealing them and pretending they're mine, nor am I playing a quotes game with you. =] Just wanted to clear that up before I got into any trouble...

Onward.

**CHAPTER FOUR**_  
CinderEllea_

"He had likewise, by another wife, a young daughter, but of unparalleled goodness and sweetness of temper, which she took from her mother, who was the best creature in the world."

I was four years old the first time ma mère read me _Cendrillon, ou la petite pantoufle de verre_ by Charles Perrault. I was swept up in the old fairytale, with its magic and ball gowns and the handsome prince who saved the lovely heroine. I was little, and therefore had no real concept of romantic love, or what it felt like to be held by a man; but I knew, as I lay bundled beneath my warm covers, that ma mère must have her own handsome prince, because a princess must always have her one true love.

_Le mari avait, de son côté, une jeune fille, mais d'une douceur et d'une bonté sans exemple: elle tenait cela de sa mère, qui était la meilleure personne du monde._

"Qui est-ce?" I asked innocently, my eyes wide with the naïve curiosity of a lonely little girl.

"Qui?" Mère was tucking my fairytale book into place on my little bookshelf. I watched her graceful hands as her long fingers slid lovingly down its embossed golden spine, which read _Histoires ou contes du temps passé, avec des moralités: Contes de ma mère l'Oye_. It was my favorite book, then, before _Le Petit Prince_ or _Alice's Adventures in Wonderland_ or even _The Wonderful Wizard of Oz_, which I became partial to at the age of nine. (I even went so far as to beg my mother for a little black dog I could name Toto, but that is another story for another time.)

"Le prince," I answered, picturing mère twirling around a ballroom in a luxurious white gown with a large bow. "Ton prince."

Her eyes became silent at my innocent inquiry. Her beautiful hands looked strained as she tucked my blankets tight around my shoulders, and her lips were pursed quite firmly when she granted me my goodnight kiss. Her answer was a mumbled, "Je ne sais pas," before she pulled the string on my lamp and bade me goodnight.

I saw the same silence in her eyes when I asked _"Who is Chuck Bass?"_ I watched the smile melt from her lips, and when I looked back to her chocolate brown eyes, they were as silent as my school library during study time.

Sometimes, on the rare days when I felt I knew my mother's mind completely, I would pretend that I could see the cogs whirling and spinning her brain. It made me feel like I could predict her thoughts before she thought them, because her thoughts were my own thoughts – we were mother and daughter, after all, shouldn't we think alike? But as I sat there and truly felt the utter stillness in the eyes I had not inherited, I knew I did not understand her at all.

"Où-est mon papa?" I had asked her once, before the diary, before the photograph, before the lies and the thinly veiled fairytales. All of my friends at the park had daddies to pick them up and swing them around; I had ma mère, who didn't like to get her clothes dirty, and Dorota, who preferred to put ribbons in my hair and dress me up like a doll. Papère liked to swing me around and tickle me mercilessly until I cried with laughter and begged him to stop, and grand-père would hoist me onto his shoulders so I could see the chateau from the perspective of a giant grown up.

But none of them were my papa. So, I asked where he was.

And mère looked up from her book, tilted her head down to me, and said "Je ne sais pas."

"Qui est mon papa?"

"Je ne sais pas."

"Does he love me?"

"I don't know."

"Will he ever visit me?"

"I don't know."

I learned, very quickly, to stop asking about my papa. The answer was always "Je ne sais pas."

_I don't know._

"Who is Chuck Bass?"

The silence in her eyes told me her answer. I laid my head back against my feathery pillow, closed my eyes, and tried to imagine ma mère in a cloudy white ball gown, with shimmering silver details and a large bow, decorated only with the diamond necklace she kept locked in papère's safe at Chateau Waldorf. I could no longer picture it as clearly as I once had, and the loss of the make-believe memory made me clench my eyes together to dam my tears.

My bedroom door clicked shut after she left, and I heard the unspoken answer in my ear.

"Who is Chuck Bass?"

_Je ne sais pas._

Breakfast was a quiet affair the following morning.

I donned my school clothes and a beret to shield my hair from the wind, and then let Dorota shine my patent leather shoes before I slid them on over pristinely white socks. She curled the ends of my hair in feathery whisps so that the style would seem as natural as possible, then fastened a strand of cultured pearls under my collar. I looked at myself in the mirror and felt like an old woman.

Mother was sitting at her usual seat in front of the French windows, which overlooked our garden. I sat down across from her, crossed my legs at their ankles, and gently unfolded my napkin and placed it in my lap. Dorota brought me my plate, and I stared thoughtfully at the delicious selections before choosing a grape from the center of the table and chewing on it instead. My stomach could not support the hot scrambled eggs or fluffy, buttered crêpes, so I filled up on fruit and water and hoped it would sustain me until lunchtime.

What I really wanted was for mère to catch me and tease me about my pithy appetite.

"Enjoy all of your food, while you can," she would say, smirking at some private joke as she spread jam onto her toast.

She was always smirking at a private joke, and she never clued me into the punch line.

But mère did not comment on my eating habits, or ask me about any interesting dreams I might have had the night before, or even ask about the school project I had been working on the day before. Instead, she read her favorite sections of the morning paper, sipped her café au lait, then cut her grapefruit and stared thoughtfully into the music room at our white grand piano.

I thought she might lecture me about me neglecting my musical studies. Instead, she finished the last of her grapefruit, dabbed at her ruby red mouth with her napkin, and left me alone to stare forlornly at the breakfast table. I pushed my plate away and looked into the garden through the French doors. Spring had caused white tulips, pink roses, and lavender carnations to sprout and bloom, but they were not doing well in the unseasonably cold weather. I toyed with the idea of walking in the garden before school (maybe I could find a pretty carnation to pin to my shirt?), but soon drifted into the adjoining music room instead.

I was drawn to the white piano.

It was exquisite in the sunlight that streamed through the sheer ivory curtains. I traced the familiar keys and played a little tune before sliding onto the bench and experimentally pumping the pedals to see that they were still in working order. Of course mère still had the tuner come by to check up on it, even though I hardly ever looked at it anymore and much preferred to pluck the strings of my beautiful pedal harp. Of course she maintained it. When I was very young, and had just learned my first few clumsy renditions of Frere Jacques and Savez-vous Planter Les Choux, she would have friends over so she could show me off and prove that I was better than their little girls.

Of course, I was. I smiled a little wider.

"Because you're a Waldorf," she would say. And I was, of course.

I let my finger fall on E-flat and frowned at the golden letters that spelled YAMAHA above the piano's ivory keys.

"_But, mama. I am not a Waldorf, en vérité, am I? I am really another name that I do not know, non?"_

On my very first day of primary school, after mère was satisfied with my hair and shoes and bag, she had hugged me close to her and kissed the top of my head with so much love that I could feel it seeping into my skin and filling me with warmth. I squeezed her hard until she pulled away and smiled at me with a watery expression that made me feel very ashamed – I wondered if I had done something wrong.

But she produced a handkerchief from her pocket and wiped her own eyes, then mine. Then, she took my hand, straightened my little tie, and led me to the front doors so I could join my new classmates. I remember crying even harder when I realized I could never go back to nursery school or my grand section schoolmates ever again, and I missed my kind teacher with her dark red hair and friendly smile, and I didn't like my shoes because they were uncomfortable, and I didn't like the curls in my hair, and I wanted to go home and hug my teddy bears and cry where no one could see me. Mère dabbed my eyes once more and sent me up the steps.

"Tu êtes une dame maintenant."

I stopped crying immediately, because ladies did not cry on the school steps so everyone could look at them. I turned up my nose at a bawling little girl (she seemed so very childish to me then), stormed up the steps and into the school with all the authority I could muster, and took a seat in the very front row with all of my supplies packed neatly into my pale pink Prada bag.

The teacher made me move to the back because my surname began with a W, and I was sitting where the B's were meant to sit.

YAMAHA blurred into one indistinct blob as I recalled that memory, and the letters stayed blurred until Dorota came to prod me about getting to school on time. I had my perfect record to maintain, after all, and didn't I want to attend université? So I left the piano, found my brand new Louis Vuitton carrier, and ran to my white limo before my chauffer drove to my school without me.

When we entered the city and the rush of people and automobiles increased along rue Saint-Jacques, I stared at the beautiful buildings and the beautiful people without really seeing them or realizing they were real –I felt that it was my limousine, not those tall buildings, that sat still and proud with the expertise of a thing that had been doing it for centuries. The world was moving around me at a startling pace, and I was caught in the middle with no father, no name, no curls, and no answers to my questions.

Qui étais-je? Who was I?

Je ne le savais pas_._ I did not know.

* * *

**Translations:  
**_Cendrillon, ou la petite pantoufle de verre_ - Cinderella; or, The Little Glass Slipper  
_Histoires ou contes du temps passé, avec des moralités: Contes de ma mère l'Oye_ - Tales from Times Past; or, Tales of Mother Goose  
_Le mari avait, de son côté, une jeune fille, mais d'une douceur et d'une bonté sans exemple: elle tenait cela de sa mère, qui était la meilleure personne du monde._ - The English translation is provided in the story, at the very beginning of the chapter  
Qui est-ce? - Who is he?  
Qui? - Who?  
Le prince/Ton prince - The prince/Your prince  
Où-est mon papa? - Where is my daddy?  
Je ne sais pas - I do not know  
Tu êtes une dame maintenant - You are a lady now


	5. Bang Bang Bang Bang

**A/N:** I do not think all French people are snobs. Nor do I think all American tourists are idiots. But most stereotypes exist with a grain of truth and, well...16-year-old Elle Waldorf _is _a downright snob. Americans happen to be her favorite target because of her mother, but I think that will become abundantly clear in-text. Also, the event I wrote about between the American tourist and Elle is based on a true story I read somewhere on a tourist website. It was so amusing to me that it stuck in my brain and I just had to use it as a punchline.

Enjoy!

BTW, the album I listened to during the 'club scene' was Ribbed Music for the Numb Generation by Sohodolls, so... ;)

**EDIT:** And a big thank you to lamiss12, who helped me make this chapter more authentic. =]

_"So we put on our eyeliner and a bit of glitter dust  
Life at night is always finer, neon streets are full of lust" _

**CHAPTER FIVE**  
_Bang Bang Bang Bang_

I was 16, and we lived in the 16th arrondissement of Paris, where I attended Lycée Janson de Sailly by day and hid in the Jardins du Trocadéro by night. When the gardens were overpopulated by Le Culte de la Tour Eiffel, as I called tourists, I hid in whatever café or musée happened to be blessedly free of them. I had grown to despise most tourists – their clicking little digital cameras, which fell prey to their inexperienced owners clumsy fingers, stole the soul of my precious city and made it a commodity for dinner gossip.

I was a complete snob.

Americans, especially, irked me to the point that I was outright abrasively rude to them. I glared at them as they passed in their stupid t-shirts and ugly caps, and rolled my eyes when they stumbled awkwardly over my language.

"Par lay voos English?" one asked, glancing up from her English-to-French dictionaries and smiling apologetically for the slaughter.

"Mais oui," I replied, eyeing her last season boots, too-blunt haircut with unflattering bangs, and horrifically ugly backpack. "I do."

"Oh, good!" She looked relieved, and the dog-eared dictionary went straight into her Jansport monstrosity. It didn't even go with her 'outfit'. "I don't speak a single word! I've had the most difficult time getting around without my husband – he's really the linguistics expert, but he came down with something funny after we ate at this little restaurant in...Oh." She saw my arched eyebrow and shook her head at herself. "I'm sorry – or desolay, is it? Jay swee desolay. Do you know where Avenue Montaigne is located?"

"Yes, I do."

And I kept walking.

My snobbery was not only for tourists, however. I judged everything I came in contact with – food, drink, art, fashion, even people I never spoke to. _Too tall_, I would think as I watched a scarecrow woman cross the street at Avenue des Champs-Élysées. She was much too tall, because she stood over a head above me and still had the audacity to wear dangerous stiletto heels. _Too eager_, I tagged an ES student in the hallways of Janson. He asked later, big-eyed and admiringly if I was ready to take le bac and I promptly informed him that I was 16 and he should find himself a lover who could tolerate his poor taste in shoes.

I, of course, had impeccable taste in everything, which was why I was qualified to judge everything. Especially ma mère.

Her style was stiff and structured, predictable and simple with a few surprises now and then, but generally boring and what she haughtily called 'classic'. It was all extremely expensive and well put-together, but I often wondered how she ever faced the day with any sort of brightness when she was dressed so responsibly. Was that it was like to be 37? I wondered. Did it mean sacrificing fun for the sake of order and cultured pearls? We wore the same size shoe, but I never wanted to steal from her closet.

I preferred bow ties to headbands, and always wore them at a jaunty angle beneath my collar. I liked bright colors and conflicting patterns, always in hues that gave my dark eyes a hint of pure black. I wore purple when I wanted to be taken seriously, yellow when I wanted to get my way, white when I felt particularly whimsical, and red when I wanted to look like a girl from the streets of Pigalle.

One day after class, as I sat aloof in my seat and packed up my materials, one of my 'friends' (I thought of them in quotations because I entertained them mostly for convenience – after all, the most popular girl in school had to have a group of adoring subjects or she was queen in name only) came up to my desk and told me that she wanted to take everyone to La Maison du Chaton that night for her birthday.

She was silently asking for my approval, and I let her suffer for a while as I slowly gathered my bag and stood up.

(I wasn't really letting her suffer. I was trying to remember her name.)

"_La Maison is done_," I informed her, sounding every bit as powerful as someone who could pronounce the student body's favorite club 'done'.

"_Oh,_" the girl's face fell slightly, but she knew better than to display weakness in front of me. I had shunned other girls for much less.

"_We'll go to _Trois_,_" I told her as we sauntered to her next class. Well, I sauntered. She followed along behind, in my shadow.

"Trois?" Her voice quavered hesitantly. Her life was boring, dull, and structured, just like my mother's. She was such an unremarkable person, just like my mother, and I felt sickened by her presence before she could even utter a reluctant agreement. Words of agreement left her mouth, I'm sure, but I was not there to hear them. I had already moved on.

I grew impatient with things often, then. I moved from thing to thing and place to place without any thought, just the desire to move on.

That night, I took David, Adele, Leon, Tristan, Nicholas, Eve, and Sophie with me to the club. They were the only people at Janson that loved to risk as much as I did, but most of them were pretty tame compared to Tristan, Sophie, and I. We called our little group Les Misérables because we fancied ourselves tortured young souls with difficult lives, instead of the well-heeled bourgeoisie we really were. At least everyone else at Janson owned up to their true identities – they accepted their good fortune with all the gratitude and respect it deserved.

Les Misérables abhorred it.

"_Where are we going?_" David lit up the first fine cigarette of the evening and passed it to Eve on his left. She made sure to exhale the smoke away from me.

"Trois," I answered, pouring some wine into Tristan's glass and crossing my smooth, bare legs towards him.

Tristan Marchand was my every dream realized in one tall, dark, handsome, suave, worldly, filthy rich, tortured artist soul with the chiseled face of every prince charming I had ever read about as a child. Sophie and I, though best friends, were constantly vying for his affections and at that point, I was in the lead. He had been grinning at me all night in his wolfish way, an upturn of his soft, thick lips that looked unnaturally predatorial on his darkly striking face.

Sophie wore a rather thin black dress that cut just above the small of her back and barely covered her thighs. I had to admit, she pulled it off rather nicely with her smoky makeup and unnaturally smooth waves of dark blonde hair, and I was even a little jealous of her ridiculously long legs and model gait.

But she was no Waldorf.

I was significantly smaller than her, with a short, dark brown bobcat cut, and legs that only looked marginally long due to my red Christian Louboutins (the heels of which were so sharp they could have sliced through diamonds). I wore red when I wanted to look like a girl from the streets of Pigalle, and I knew that a naughty brunette in a little red dress would always beat a model blonde in basic black.

We had a bet going, at the time – who could lose their virginity first? But it was important that we made the competition interesting; after all, if one of us ran out, batted our eyelashes, and had a tumble with the first willing boy we met, then the challenge was gone and the bet was unfair. We had to raise the stakes, and that meant competing for the same boy on the same night in the same place at the same time. The winner won the boy, bragging rights, and ownership of the school.

The loser would lose it to whoever the winner chose.

I handed Tristan his wine and let my hand brush just slightly against the inside of his wrist, lightly enough that it seemed like an accident, but firmly enough that the memory of it would stick with him for the rest of the night. He would picture me grasping his wrists as he backed me up against the wall and attacked the sensitive areas on my neck with those full, soft lips of his. It was a dance we had waltzed together many times before, but the music always stopped shy of crescendo – I heard Dorota bustling down the hallway, his father knocked on his bedroom door, the janitor decided it was the perfect time to clean the girls' lavatory, et cetera.

But I knew, I felt it in my adrenaline-fueled blood, that I would lose my virginity to Tristan Marchand that night. If not at Trois Club, then in the limo on the way home, or in my bedroom with the lights off because mère was in New York visiting grandmamma, saba, Uncle Aaron, and my godmother Serena and her family. My godfather, another friend of my mother's from her years in the States, was supposed to check in on me from time to time from the Van der Bilt mansion, but he never stopped by in person. That left only Dorota as a potential obstacle, but I had taken every opportunity to overload her with chores throughout the week...I hoped that would be enough to make her sleep like the dead in mère's absence.

I smiled coyly at Tristan and felt triumphant when he grinned wolfishly back.

Sophie sat close to Tristan as the DJ spun, letting her long hair fall across his arm as she leaned in to whisper things in his ear, but his fingers stroked my left knee under the table and left teasing sparks on my skin. I excused myself from the table under the pretense of going to the ladies' room and refreshing my 'Really Red' Revlon matte lipstick, but I let his hand grasp my thigh as I stood, and drew his eyes to my slim swaying hips as I headed for the shadows.

It wasn't long before I felt him –and I do mean all of him – pressed up against me from behind. His large, perfect hands glided up and down my back, then around my waist to my hips and the skin under my bellybutton. I felt his warm lips push against the underside of my earlobe, then the pleasant thrill as he took the delicate skin of my neck between his teeth and suckled and kissed just enough to hamper my breathing.

The music from the stage thrummed through our bodies as he turned me around and ground me into the wall, his hips moving against mine with enough electricity to keep even the City of Lights up and running for a year. One of his hands gripped the thickest part of my short hair and he forced his mouth on mine with such bruising force that I felt thankful the wall was holding me up.

"Tu me rends fou," he muttered in my ear, his other hand rubbing the flesh underneath my red dress.

I groaned and wrapped a leg around him so he could hoist me onto his hips. This position put my lips even with his, and the kiss became even more violent as I too started gripping at his hair and at the skin underneath his well-fitted but unstructured shirt. I tugged at his neck and let my hips react to his as he slowly and ruthlessly drove me deeper and deeper into the unmoving wall.

"_Here?_" I choked on the query as his fingers slid beneath the red silk panties I had purchased for just this occasion.

"Non." His answer made his hot breath on my collarbone seem a little less welcome.

"Quoi? Pourquoi pas?" I was aware that my voice cracked and sounded a bit desperate, and that if I had any dignity left I would climb off of him and demand that he get his act together before he dared to assault me in a dark corridor again. But something kept my sharp heel hooked around him, and that same something made me shudder with want for him as I let his hands guide my hips against the part of him that wanted _me_.

The groan came from the back of his throat, and the low growl of it made my mind up for me.

"Elle."

Whatever he asked me to do, I would do it.

"Oui?"

He moved his deft, broad fingers back under my red panties and let them dance tauntingly just outside the place I wanted them. "_Not now_."

"Oui, maintenant!" I demanded, because I always got my way. My jaw jutted sharply in a defiant, angled way that did not come from ma mère.

"Non," he repeated, and he set me back down on the pinprick edges of my Christian Louboutins before he returned to our booth.

Frustrated, livid, a little beside myself, and altogether quite embarrassed by my obvious lack of raw sex appeal, I retreated into the fluorescent lavatory and inspected myself in one of the finely polished mirrors. The dim light of the club disguised all my little imperfections – the pointed, thin nose, the too-big lips, the sharp jaw and chin that my angled bob and full bangs were designed to balance out. My dress was a bit disheveled, my hair was sticking up in a few odd places, and the lipstick that wasn't smeared around my lips had been completely kissed off.

And my panties were utterly, utterly wet and useless.

I stared at my reflection for a long time, thinking of little ways I could improve myself. I could say _je t'aime_ to mère once in a while without cringing, I could grow my hair out past my shoulders and see if that didn't look too ugly, I could be nice to a tourist and an insipid boy from Janson all in one day and not feel dirty about it, I could stop pretending that I didn't have anything in common with ma mère and accept that I was her daughter whether or not I knew my père.

I could be brave and ask her who he was.

We had not broached the subject since that night in the old house at Marnes-la-Coquette. I had kept the photograph of mère and Chuck Bass locked safely in the false bottom of my jewelry chest, and the old Italian leather diary had gone behind my childhood fairytales on the bookshelf in my study room. The unanswered question had been hanging between us for five years, and the air showed no sign of clearing until one of us bit the bullet and either told the truth or asked for it.

But I was afraid to hear those words again. _Je ne sais pas._

"Who am I?" I asked my reflection, and I was surprised when I saw my face move.

Was that what I looked like when I talked to people? Did my eyebrows really slant that way and shadow my eyes, did my lip really quirk so conceitedly? My mother's mouth never did that, it only pouted knowingly and elegantly under _her _'Really Led' lipstick. It was another thing we _didn't_ have in common, a list much longer than the things we did as far as I was concerned. And every thing we didn't have in common made me wonder...

Did _he _and I have it in common? Did his lips smirk so easily? Was his hair so very dark and untameable? Did he like bow ties?

_Who am I?_ I should have been asking _Who is he?_

The lavatory door opened and the clatter of expensive Manolo Blahniks on tile forced me to tear my eyes away from my reflection. Sophie strode past me and to another mirror, and I noticed that her pink lipstick was smeared and the skirt of her black dress was riding a little higher than it should have been. She caught my eye in the mirror and smiled charitably.

"Interesting evening, hmm?"

"Interesting."

I left Les Misèrables to find their own ways home. I even left Sophie to claim Tristan as her prize for the evening, and resigned myself to the fact that my virginity would likely be lost to one of the very insipid boys we liked to mock in the hallways between classes. I hoped Sophie would at least be kind and pick a jansonien about to sit for le bac. There would be some dignity in that, at least.

But I went home instead of dwelling on my future exploits. As I had hoped she would be, Dorota was fast asleep in her room and muttering quite incoherently about something called a takedown, herds of geese, Lysol, and 'yes, Miss Blair'. A message on the answering machine from ma mère told me she had asked my godfather to stop in for some lunch on Sunday and that I should be sure not to invite any of my friends over during his visit. This made me immediately grip my phone to start sending invitations for a formal luncheon, but I remembered myself in the bathroom mirror at Trois Club and I went to brush my teeth instead.

When I was ready for bed, I booted up my sleek new laptop and typed in a search query as soon as I opened my web browser.

_Chuck Bass_

Several hundred useless results cropped up instantly, but one caught my eye. **Bass Industries**?

I didn't really consider myself a devotee of Forbes magazine, or even that knowledgeable about the business world past the smatterings I had learned from papère and my business classes. But I knew what Bass Industries was, how powerful it was, and how much of the world it owned from its home office in New York City. _Bass_. When I finally saw the name glaring at me in underlined blue on the flat smoothness of my LCD laptop screen, when I finally realized that the name was real and not some alias my mother had penned in some fancy urge to be incognito, it just seemed so...obvious.

I clicked on the link, and it took me to a streamlined web page that utilized all the right navigational tools and operated under easy-to-read colors. The sharp logo spun at the top of the page, alongside a montage of pictures that included shots of what I assumed was the home office, a few of the more famous buildings the company owned, and several photos of rather important looking businessmen shaking hands.

And, underneath the company creed, the unassuming italicized phrase that made my throat go completely dry.

_CEO, Charles Bass_

He was real.

I instantly scoured the website for a picture of him, but there was nothing. Only information on the company from its early days under his father, Bartholomew Bass, to more updated paragraphs on _Charles Bass_ and his unbelievable business savvy and leadership skills, which were remarkable for a man so young. It sounded ridiculously stodgy and official, and reminded me distinctly of my mother's put-together-to-death ensembles.

I broadened my search.

_Gossip Chuck Bass_

I paused then, my hands poised over the keys, and mulled a few things over. It very well may have been residual smoke in my lungs from my evening in Trois Club, and the wine in the limo very possibly had something to do with it, but instead of hitting search on these terms, I added something else.

_Gossip Chuck Bass Blair Waldorf_

The first link had nothing to do with my query, but the second one fulfilled all of my requirements and stood out in bold from the others.

_**Gossip **Girl__//__**Bassdorf**__  
Looks like __**Blair **__and __**Chuck **__came with quite the appetite... for destruction, that is... __**Chuck Bass**__ losing something nobody even knew he had... Spotted: __**Blair **__and __**Chuck **__reunited... Spotted: __**Chuck Bass**__ waiting for the Jitney... XOXO __**Gossip **__Girl..._

I knew, just from those little tidbits of information, that I was about to learn the truth. Or, a truth, at least - one that looked pretty concrete and incredibly thorough, from the number of times ma mère's name had popped up in conjunction with Chuck Bass's...they even had their own little page, just for them. "Bassdorf?"

I would have thought Chair or maybe...Waldass. But it said Bassdorf.

Before I clicked the link that would lead to my answers, I glanced over my shoulder to check for...I don't know what I was checking for. Ma mère magically back from the States to hover oppressively over my shoulder? I pulled the covers up over me and my laptop to prevent this scary eventuality from happening. Then I checked once more for Dorota, before I secured the sheets around me and stared at the glowing screen in front of me.

I was under the sheets after midnight, just as I had planned to be, but there was no Tristan with me. I wasn't sweating or panting or inhaling the sweet scent of about fifty strategically placed candles as I groaned his name and won the bet with Sophie. Instead, I was alone in my pajamas with an electronic device.

The thought of Sophie straddling Tristan and losing it right that second made me press my thumb down and select the link to Gossip Girl. It had to be worth it...it just had to be.

_Hey Upper East Siders, Gossip Girl here - your one and only source into the scandalous lives of Manhattan's elite..._

**Translations:**  
Arrondissement – a neighborhood, essentially  
Jardin – garden  
Le Culte de la Tour Eiffel – The Eiffel Tower Cult  
Musée – museum  
ES - économique et social/economic and social sciences  
Le bac – baccalauréat (an academic qualification which French and international students take at the end of secondary school; it is the main diploma required to pursue university studies)  
Pigalle – a touristic red-light district in Paris  
Les Misérables – the miserable ones (from Victor Hugo's novel)  
"Tu me rends fou" – You drive me crazy  
"Quoi? Pourquoi pas?" – What? Why not?  
Je t'aime – I love you  
Jansonien – a student at Lycée Janson de Sailly


	6. Our Life is Not a Movie or Maybe

**A/N:** Thanks to all the readers who continue to read and review. =] It makes my day when I see a review alert in my inbox! And while I'm handing out thanks, thank you to Meghan...who basically makes my French less horrible. The name of this chapter is taken from the Okkervil River song of the same name, because that song basically sums up this chapter in my head and...I love Okkervil River. The lyric before the chapter is from that song.

"_When you looked how you looked then to me, then I cease lying and fall into silence..._"

**CHAPTER SIX**_  
Our Life is Not a Movie or Maybe_

Sophie and Tristan slept together in the back garden of his father's maison, an elaborate work of art flanked by long columns and topped with wrought iron cresting. The foyer was a museum to the Marchand family heirlooms, many of them glassed-in or protected by top secret security codes and thumbprint recognition. The adjoining sitting room housed an impressive collection of 17th century artwork, contrasted neatly by the classic contemporary furniture and large bay windows that overlooked our shared street.

Because Tristan Marchand lived two houses from mine.

As I hid underneath my silk covers and read the true story of ma mère's life, my best friend and the only boy I could imagine losing my virginity to were frolicking amidst Vivienne Marchand's Roman-inspired fountains and expertly manicured hedges. From what Sophie later told me over the phone, her first time had been short, painful, and altogether quite excruciating. But that had only been the first time. She gushed to me about the subsequent three romps, and was about to recount the fourth in vivid detail when I put my acting skills to work and faked a brilliant bout of illness.

Or, at least, I faked it over the telephone line. As soon as my thumb mashed down on the cancel button, I felt the bile rise in my throat. I barely made it to my porcelain toilet in time to lose the entirety of Dorota's finely cooked dinner in its depths.

_Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant  
Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant -- et c'est mon droit  
Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant_

I vaguely heard Tristan's ring tone blaring from the other room as I fell to my knees and gripped the smooth edges of the bowl. My fingers grew numb and flashing black-and-white dots swam in front of my eyes, and by the time I was dry heaving and aching from my every sweat-clogged pore, I completely blacked out. The ring tone was the last thing I comprehended before my head hit the tile.

_Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant -- il est mon roi  
Oui c'est mon amant, et alors maman  
Oui c'est mon amant, et alors maman -- laisse-le moi  
Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant  
Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant -- il est à moi_

In my head, it was Sophie singing. She wore the little black dress from Trois, and one of her finely shaped legs was wrapped easily around a familiar set of hips. He barely had to hoist her up to meet his demanding kisses, and she grinned at me from over his shoulder as he teased the bottom of her earlobe with his sharp, devilish teeth.

"Yes, he's my lover, he's my lover." Her nude lips smiled in that honest-to-Dieu innocent way of hers. "He is mine."

I realized she was mocking my voice, and the discovery made a rather naked fury rise up in the very pit of my chest. Before I could stalk forward and rip her away from Tristan by the roots of her unnaturally shiny hair, a halo enveloped the two of them and they became another couple entirely. I was standing at the top of a flight of steps, surrounded by warm wooden walls and low chandelier light that cast a romantic glow over the dark carpets and chiseled panels of the ceiling.

A petite girl wore a cloudy white ball gown with shimmering silver details and a large bow. Her lips lovingly caressed the neck of a devastatingly handsome boy, whose eyes caught mine and acknowledged my staggered presence with a celebratory wink. I felt my mouth quirk out of some well-practiced reflex, and noticed that my white-gloved hand was gripping the railing hard enough to snap it in two. I saw my face in the reflection of the glossy wall and –

It _was_ my face. My jaw was sharply angled, adorned with an aristocratic nose and an effortless haughtiness that shone through even my blackest misery. The eyes were mine, narrowed and shadowed. I was looking at myself, but I was someone else. I was looking at the face of Chuck Bass as it had been the night of ma mère's debutante ball.

And it was my face.

I woke in a cold sweat, after the reflection blurred and became Sophie and Tristan again. Rather than pulling myself off snow white tile and smelling the putrid stench of my stomach fluids as they rotted in the toilet, I found myself cushioned by my memory foam mattress and smelling my own familiar perfume. Dorota had found me and dressed me in a pair of conservative pajamas. I lifted a hand to my mouth and found that even my breath was fresh and minty, and a quick inspection of my hair told me that it was clean, combed, and brushed to a chestnut gloss.

The blue numbers on my alarm clock told me it was almost 2 AM on Sunday morning. My phone was lying unassumingly on my bedside table, but its utter nearness made me automatically reach for it to check my messages. **1 MISSED CALL from TRISTAN MARCHAND**, read one tab; **1 TEXT MESSAGE from SOPHIE SCHUMACHER** read another; **2 VOICEMAILS**.

I deleted Sophie's SMS without even bothering to glance at its subject, then cuddled beneath my sympathetic covers as I dialed my voicemail.

"_You have 2 unheard messages_," the urbane, generic female voice intoned, and I wondered if they actually hired a real person to do that merde. I knew, intellectually, that they used a computer generated set of noises to recreate the human voice, but I entertained the thought of a woman locked in a recording studio chanting every conceivable number until infinity.

'Un, deux, trois, quatre, cinq, six... You have one hundred thousand unheard messages, and still nobody wants you. How does that feel?'

I stared at my bathroom door without really seeing it. I was busy imagining the scene behind it – the pristine toilet that melded perfectly into the immaculate tile, which lead to the deep Jacuzzi bath and streamlined steam shower. I really, really wanted to take a piping hot shower and wash away the memory of that sadistically intrusive dream.

"_First message sent today at 12:18 AM:_ Hey, Elle, it's Tristan. Pick up your phone. ...This better not be one of those times when you don't answer your mobile because you 'just don't feel like it'. Come on, _ma petite_, answer the phone. I have something important to tell you. Meet me at our place? It's important. I'll wait around for you, and you know I will. Don't make me freeze my ass off in the cold, all right? _Au revoir_, for now. _End of message. To delete this message, press 7. To save it in the archives, press 9. To hear more options, press 0._"

I pressed 9 without really looking at my mobile, then proceeded to the next voice mail.

"_Next message sent yesterday at 7:42 PM._ Hey, Elle belle, just checking in to make sure you remember to get spruced up for my visit tomorrow. I've got a present for you, but don't get too excited – it hardly cost me any money and it's something you already have. No, it's not my presence, though that has been said to be a gift in itself. See you at around noon and try not to torture Dorota too much with really elaborate plans – it's just me, after all. Love you, kid._ End of message. To dele –_ "

My thumb pushed 7 without consulting my brain.

Then, my body rolled itself out of my queen-size bed and my eyes assembled a warm-yet-sexy-in-a-bohemian-way ensemble that my hands proceeded to pull out of my closet so my body could step into it. Even though Tristan would never see me naked, I still had the right to make him wonder – so I neglected to slip on a bra. I left my silk pajamas pooled in a puddle on the plush carpet.

Because my limousine driver was fast asleep in his cozy flat above the carport, I donned my favorite winter coat and walked the distance from our shared residential street to Avenue Foch and the chestnut tree that stood in commemoration of our first kiss. It was different from the other chestnut trees that lined the avenue, but only because I could vividly remember its bark in my back as Tristan pawed passionately at my hips.

I saw him before he saw me, because I had perfected the art of invisibility and he preferred the science of visibility. He leaned so casually against the trunk, and let his lit cigarette dangle so precariously over the edge of his bottom lip, and I suddenly remembered why Sophie and I had made the bet in the first place. Yes, it had been about pride and victory, but it had also been about _him_ and his Jeremy Dufour lips and harshly definite cheekbones, which hollowed out his face so perfectly whenever he took a drag... and his lips puckered just so when he exhaled...

He had always been the one boy I could never find fault with. I was desperate and hopeless and greedy with his affections, and I was a Siren with steel talons when another girl so much as breathed flirtatiously in his general direction. He had always responded differently to me, had always softened when I neared, had always abandoned more interesting pursuits to whittle away meaningless hours in my frivolous company. We kissed each others lips more frequently and knew each others curves more intimately than any 'official' couple I could think of, and he held my hand when we crossed crowded avenues, and he tucked my hair behind my ear when the wind blew it in my eyes...

And he slept with Sophie the first time she drank one too many and threw herself at him. She was no Waldorf, but she was no common horse-faced tramp either. If only she hadn't worn Manolo Blahnik – Tristan really preferred Christian Louboutin.

He had told me, once, a lazy summer day in the Marchand garden. "_They make me want to kiss your feet_."

"_Ew!_" My protest had been half-hearted at best, and would have been more believable had I actually rolled away from his advances.

I watched him and knew the precise moment he felt my presence. His shoulders straightened and he scraped his charcoal-calloused fingers through the smooth strands of his dark hair. He expected me to come to him, so he stayed where he was and eyed my figure while he finished his cigarette. One of his Camel Rares flicked back and forth between his wolf-like teeth as he pondered my arrival, and I knew he considered this night to be a special affair. He only pulled the dignified metal tin out of his personal safe when he wanted to remember a particular event with outstanding clarity.

I only remembered him savoring a Rare one time before that: the day his father married Vivienne Sauvage. Her real name was Vivian Savage, and she came from a nowhere town in California. The cigarette was not to commemorate his father's new found happiness in love; it was to celebrate the fact that he, Tristan, had managed to get her into bed the night before the nuptials. The society pages had shown the city a complacent husband with his brand new bride, whose arm encircled her step-son's waist with the innocent familiarity of family.

So I could not help but wonder... Was he smoking that Camel Rare because we were standing underneath our chestnut tree? Or were those transparent gray tendrils encircling his cheekbones because he was celebrating his most recent conquest in his step-mother's gardens?

The cigarette did not fall under his heel – that fate was too common for his favored poison. Instead, he let the butt burn itself alive between his fingertips as he propelled himself away from his post.

"_You're late_," he told me, his voice thick with smoke and fatigue.

"_I was asleep," _I defended, peeling my coat from my shoulders. The sight of him under the city lights was enough to warm me up. "_Kindly explain why I am here and not safely in bed where I belong?"_

"_Because I'm not safely in your bed," _His response was exactly the response I had expected, because I knew him well enough to know how the words connected in his mind. Bed meant sex and me plus a bed meant partial nudity and hurried groping before his father called his name from the bottom of the stairs. It was the same for me when I thought of him – only, in my mind, it was Dorota interrupting the perfect movie with her stern _God knows what you're doing in there_ tone of voice. "_And we both know you belong wherever I am._"

The wind attacked my eyes like a swarm of angry bees, but I was experienced enough to avoid being stung.

"_Even when you're two doors down giving Sophie the most mind-blowing evening of her entire life?_"

Tristan didn't shrug indifferently or smirk proudly like I had imagined he would. Instead, he took my coat from where I had draped it over my arm and wrapped it back around my shoulders like a very chic cape. Then, he leaned in close enough to tickle the tips of my eyelashes with the tips of _his_ eyelashes, and I could not breathe because his eyes were too green and his breath on my cheeks was making me delirious and he smelled like soap and Diesel Fuel For Life.

Somehow, my ears managed to hear him over the magnetic pull I felt between our bodies.

"_I have a story about that. I think you'll like it._"

He tried to nip at my neck but the touch made me feel like a cheap whore, so I winced and he pulled away.

"_If it's about how you ravished her four times, I've already heard._" I grimaced, so he would know just how _much_ I had heard.

The wolfish grin from my limousine returned, but our proximity made it hard to interpret. I thought it meant he wanted to pin me to a very solid surface so he could devastate my mouth with his expert tongue, then pull away just when I thought we might really keep going for once. But the way his fingers lightly caressed my chilled arms through the material of my winter coat... it was not consistent with the wolfish grin, and everything I knew about his mannerisms leaked slowly out of my ears, along with most of my ability to form a coherent thought.

"_Is that what she told you?_"

I reacted almost immediately with a frown. "_That's the truth, isn't it? No girl would lie about her first time._"

His eyelashes really did tickle mine then, and suddenly the arc of his made-for-kissing lips made sense to my addled mind.

"_She wasn't_..." I let my question float away on a gust of wind, then buried my face in his chest before I could ask the rest of it.

"_She wasn't_. _And it will make an interesting story come Monday morning, won't it?_" Those bruising lips pressed against the crown of my head, and my waist was wrapped in the same arms I had gripped in the dim Trois hallway the night before. "_Especially when everyone finds out that I was really with you all night._"

'But you weren't,' I wanted to say. 'You were with her, whether she was a virgin or not. You spent the night with her.'

I had spent _my _night reading old Gossip Girl entries about ma mère's reign over the Upper East Side of Manhattan. The details had unfolded like a seminal novel or brilliantly scripted movie, where ma mère was cast in the role of a beautiful ice-hearted villainess, to my godmother Serena's radiant golden princess. The ugly stepsister to Serena's Cinderella. The Wicked Witch of the West to Serena's Good Witch of the North.

My godfather was Prince Phillip on his noble steed. Aunt Jenny was the scullery maid in the kitchens.

And Chuck Bass was the black knight.

...Or Westley. But mostly just Jafar without the turban.

But mère had been no Buttercup. Her years at Constance Billard School for Girls were documented meticulously and preserved unspoiled in the archives of Gossip Girl. Com, and though I had not managed to finish the entire collective in one sitting, I had gleaned enough from the witty quips and seamless pop culture references to know that my godfather's friendly visit was going to be more of an inquisition than a sit-down luncheon.

Before I could go over my mental checklist of things-to-find-out, Tristan dropped a line of kisses from the top of my head to my down turned mouth. "_Stop thinking._"

For once I heeded his instructions, closed my eyes, and let the feel of him overwhelm me. I could not smell a trace of Sophie's perfume, and a vague outer part of me was grateful that he had at least managed to clean her off of him before meeting with me. Then a sneaky little thought crawled six-legged across the inside of my eyelids. _I wonder if she still smells like him_.

That unwelcome thought made me hold him tighter.

"_Let me take you home, _ma petite." His fingers curled in my short hair, then his palm cupped my neck while his other hand tilted my chin toward his. "_Your mother is still in the States, isn't she?_"

"Oui," I whispered, suddenly burdened by an abrupt exhaustion. "_Until Tuesday."_

"_Until Tuesday,_" he whispered into my mouth.

I let him take my hand and lead me home.

* * *

**Translations:  
**The French lyrics are from the Nous Non Plus song _L'Amant_ or _The Lover_:

_Yes he's my lover, he's my lover  
Yes he's my lover, he's my lover – and it's my right  
Yes he's my lover, he's my lover  
Yes he's my lover, he's my lover – he is my king  
Yes he's my lover, so what mother  
Yes he's my lover, so what mother – leave him to me  
Yes he's my lover, he's my lover  
Yes he's my lover, he's my lover – he is mine_

Merde - shit  
Dieu - God  
Ma petite - Literally, my small one; a term of endearment


	7. The Dress Looks Nice on You

**A/N:** Happy (late) Valentine's Day to the Elle/Tristan shippers. And lamiss12, if you read this and see any egregious French errors, do tell me about them. =]

The title of this chapter comes from the Sufjan Stevens song of the same name.

**CHAPTER SEVEN**  
_The Dress Looks Nice on You_

That night – or unfathomable early morning, as Tristan called it with a winning smirk – I snuck in through the back kitchen door. It was always unlocked and propped open at night, because Dorota liked to air the kitchen out after dinner, and _courageux vieux_ Lucien Poirier, the ex-military officer who lived in the house between Tristan's and mine, kept a sharp eye on the neighborhood from his attic window. His diligence made people feel a little better about leaving windows and doors propped open, but it also made it very difficult for anyone, even frisky adults seeking a midnight rendezvous away from the children, to sneak in or out of their homes after dark.

Tristan and I, however, had made an art form out of it. We knew Poirier usually left his attic at about 3 AM to take a stroll and stretch his legs, so at 2:55 we halted just behind the hedges that separated his grounds from Tristan's and watched him abandon his window post. Three minutes later, in his best black coat and a dapper stovepipe hat, Poirier strolled out his front door with the aid of a finely polished mahogany walking stick, halted at the end of his walkway, then made a sharp right turn and marched determinedly down the street and out of sight.

I giggled into Tristan's sleeve as he made a heroic show of carrying me over my back garden wall, then shushed him urgently as he took us both tumbling into Dorota's belladonna lilies.

"_You be quiet_," I murmured, tilting my head back so his soft lips could have better access to the column of my throat. I felt his teeth skim my collarbone and bite the bow of my shoulder, let my eyes roll back when his tongue probed the hollow of my ear and his lips suckled nerveless flesh of my earlobe. I forgot where I was and for the second time in so many hours, my brain lost control over my body's actions.

Fingers somehow danced their way beneath thin filmy material and cigarette smoke breath hissed against bristled hairs when fingernails sank into skin.

"_You be loud,_" he grunted, and my legs were pulled roughly around his waist. He hovered over me and thrust his tongue between my lips.

The scent of the cold air and the sweet smell of the flowers we were lying in were overwhelmed by his cologne and the rich musky smell that came from the little crevices that cologne couldn't touch. Every place his lips and fingers and legs and hips touched lit up with that smell until I ceased to exist and he ceased to exist and there was only our perfume as we rolled around under the moon. I swore I felt little pinpricks where the stars shone down on my skin, more and more of which became revealed the longer and longer I allowed Tristan's fingers to unravel, unbutton, and unsnap the hooks and ribbons that kept my artfully constructed outfit in place.

The night felt almost like satin against the peaks of my pale pink nipples, which bloomed up in search of the warm cavern of his mouth. When his lips melted over one those aching mounds, my back curved under his grasping hands and I felt more than heard the tender cry that pushed past my clenched teeth. I wanted more than anything to feel all of him against me as I heard a similar noise leave his throat, but a nippy breeze passed under my knees and tousled the short strands of my hair where they swelled over the grass.

Before his lips could begin their endless descent down that torturous path to my underwear, I managed to remember Poirier would sooner or later return to his window and see us. As much as I liked the intelligent inside jokes the two of us could make about me being naked in a patch of belladonna lilies, and as good as the cold air felt against my skin, I managed to loosen the hold my thighs had on his torso and I slithered away from him with the grace of someone who was doing it on a bed of silk.

His hand grasped my ankle and I kicked him good-naturedly in the chest before he could drag me back underneath him.

"Elle." I shivered at the possessive rumble that shook his voice. He said my name like he had given it to me and could take it away whenever the whim struck him.

"_Not now._" I buttoned myself back up and scampered away from him when he advanced again.

"_Maintenant._"

He stretched his deft, broad fingers out to snatch the bottom of my shirt, but I pulled back. "Non. _Not now._"

"Quoi?" Tristan's mouth dropped open in shock. I had never refused before; I had always begged and pouted, and he had always pulled away prematurely. That was our game, and we had never once deviated from those unspoken rules. My change in tactic threw him off so much, it was all he could do to stand and brush the disheveled locks away from his wide-open eyes. "Oui, _maintenant._"

His slick poise was gone. I gave him a pale pink smirk and left him in the belladonna lilies.

The eastern sun lit Paris with a grey light the next day – or later that unfathomable morning, I thought to myself with my pale pink smirk – and Dorota hardly noticed the bent stems of her precious flowers where they sat in the shadows; she bustled around the kitchen with too much purpose to spare even a leisurely glance out the back windows, and I sat in the adjacent breakfast nook with a cup of café au lait and one of my school notebooks.

I had made it all the way through ma mère's high school years in the hours after Tristan's departure, and was trying to compose a concrete list of questions to ask my godfather.

Unfortunately, I was – and still am – terrible at lists.

**1. Was mère in love with Chuck Bass?**

**2. Was Chuck Bass in love with mère?**

**3. Are they still in love?**

**4. Is Chuck Bass my**

I took a long gulp of my coffee and didn't ask Dorota for a refill.

Instead, I shut the notebook, capped my ballpoint pen, and decided to spend my morning on more productive pursuits. Mère always said my organizational skills left a lot to be desired, so as part of my brand new self-improvement plan (initiated by my reflection in the bathroom mirrors at Trois) I had decided to buy a daily planner and arrange my closets in alphabetical order according to designer.

By the time I reached Alice + Olivia, I had only managed to piece together my lunch outfit (a purple dress with a square neckline and big white polka dots, lacy black tights with asymmetrical patterns, and a pair of clunky white Michael Kors sandals that I couldn't remember buying), and was seriously considering arranging everything by color instead. The front doorbell rang before I could fully realize a vague plan, which consisted of throwing my clothes away and starting over from scratch – the whole mess would be much easier to organize if I started fresh, was my basic logic. It is worth mentioning that not only did my organizational skills leave much to be desired, but I handled common sense with a practically non-existent grain of salt.

"Visitor for you, Miss Elle!" Dorota sounded impatient, but I chalked it up to her pursuit of The Perfect Lunch and headed for the stairs to greet my godfather.

The dressmaker's mirror that sat beside my closet caught my reflection and I stopped with my hand on the doorjamb.

The archives on Gossip Girl's website chronicled ma mère's teenage years with such detail and care, that there were often pictures to accompany the shocking headlines and witty articles. It was very hard to connect the two of them, the Blair Waldorf who lived and breathed and dressed in the bedroom across from mine and the Blair Waldorf who lived and breathed and dressed in Manhattan, because they were so very different. My Blair preferred to stay at home with her circle of two or three very close friends, and the only parties she attended were charity events and select shows during fashion week. The Blair I had discovered on Gossip Girl was a lot like me: always up to something, always out with a group of people she could manipulate and control, always wearing something edgy yet flattering, fitting rather than trendy, chic instead of gauche.

And despite my shoulder skimming bob and the foreign angles of my facial features, I saw her in the mirror. I saw her in the fullness of my unsmiling cheeks, in the subtle dip of my shoulders and the skinny frailty of my pale arms. I even saw her in my eyes, as black and unlike hers as they were. Even the shimmering gloss on my too-big lips seemed to make my mouth curve in a faint echo of hers, and the white sandals bent my posture out of its usual shape and into a shadow of the thrown back sweep of her dignified stance.

As eerie as it was, I accented my look with a silky yellow headband and continued my path to the stairs.

The handsome man waiting at the bottom of the stairs was _not_ the one I had expected and I immediately regretted the headband.

"Tristan?"

His dark head turned and I saw the lofty upturn of his mouth before the rest of his face came into view. "Bonjour, mademoiselle."

"En Anglais," I snapped in an undertone. Now Dorota's impatience made sense. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm here to see you, of course, _ma petite_," I felt his eyes glint wickedly as he took in my ensemble. "_What_ are you wearing?"

My right hand flew protectively to the chartreuse ribbon behind my ears. "It's my house, I'll ask the questions."

He moved with languid grace and an infuriating familiarity into ma mère's front sitting room and poured himself a glass of wine. In a sudden rush, which abated only when I put my right hand on the stair rail to steady myself, I hated that he knew exactly where the glasses and bottles were kept, and I despised how proper and comfortable he looked next to a portrait of me at five years old. He turned around and saw that I hadn't followed him, and his maddening leer actually made me feel cheap.

"I hate you when you're like this."

"Pourquoi?" He poured another glass of sparkling Crémant de Bourgogne and brought it to me with false gentlemanly poise.

I ignored the desire to remind him that _I_ was to ask the questions in my own house. He pulled my hand away from the railing and led me, quite patronizingly, to 'our' white chaise lounge chair underneath the front window. It put the view of my front lawn behind us and created a romantic backdrop for whatever illicit tryst he had in mind, but I was not charmed by his transparent methods, not even when he sat down next to me and pulled my legs to rest over his lap. My rejection the night before had made his usual dignity melt and pool at his feet like used candle wax.

But, damn me, I still found him unbearably handsome. I scooted closer, making the hem of my purple dress rid up around my thighs.

"En Anglais." I knew my demand would go unheeded. He hated English. "What are we celebrating?"

He pushed our flutes together without letting them clink, then tipped the sparkling contents of his glass past my eagerly parted lips. "Toi."

I let his hand rest intimately on the top of my thigh, even as the image of that hand kneading the same part of Sophie's anatomy made me want to recoil. I wondered if she had asked the same thing as he poured her wine from his father's collection, if he had murmured _'Toi, ma petite'_ into the valley of her breasts as she wriggled beneath him in the hedges of his mother's garden. My stomach lurched as I remembered the crushed belladonna lilies.

"You have to go," I said, and I shrunk back as my gut told me to.

"Non, je ne dois pas partir." He pushed toward me, using the arm of the chaise to propel him. His hand moved from the top of my thigh to the crease under my knee and dragged me onto my back, the better to loom over me and regain the control he so desperately yearned for. Once he had me where he wanted me, he stopped cupping his wine glass and cupped the underside of my left breast instead. My eyes fluttered closed when I felt the pad of his thumb stroking the precise spot – he knew where my puckered traitorous nipple was without any searching. "I have to stay, and you have to give in."

His hand skimmed my stomach and reached the belt of my polka-dot dress. A phantom wind from the night before seemed to dishevel my hair beneath the bow of my headband, and I wanted to pull away as I had then. Instead, I let his hands part my thighs and slide my lace tights down to my knees. The cupid's bow of his lips rubbed against the inside of my left knee, down past the gentle downward slope of my quivering skin, down and down to the place he had teased endlessly but had never seen.

"Dorota – " I thought to gasp, but the sensation of his hands rubbing slow circles across my calves made the name come out as a choked cough.

" – Is in the kitchen."

Tristan spoke against me on purpose, just so I could feel the vibrations of his words caress the frayed nerves of my lower body.

I whimpered helplessly against him and gripped one of the carnelian red throw pillows between my pale white knuckles. My hips bucked against his tongue as it thrust into me, mimicking his probing kisses in the garden. The grey light streamed through the wide windows and caught us both in a complex pattern of dim diamonds and black crosses, and the diamonds became crosses when his tongue began an intricate dance with my more intimate areas.

Everything blurred together and I found myself gripping the hair on his head and throwing my legs over his shoulders. He smirked and I knew it.

"I'm..." Tristan interrupted me with a low groan, and I squeaked in surprise when the stronger vibrations sent a blush up the entire length of my body. He burrowed deep inside me and twisted and swirled his tongue in ways I had only ever done in mocking jest across a crowded classroom; I at last understood the true meaning of 'breathless'.

Then the world aligned again as Tristan pulled away, as he always did, his lips shining in a superior sort of way. I wanted him, and the evidence was reflected in the angelic camber of his patrician grin. He had taken back his role as the self-controlled tease who left the party just when it got too loud and sweaty to bear, and I was once again the half-undressed victim left parched and panting with thirst.

Naturally, I was not pleased with that reality. I much preferred the version of myself that left him needy in the grasp of Dorota's garden, so I yanked my patterned tights up to shield myself from his bright, leering eyes. Then, without waiting for his appealing apology, I kneed him right between the legs with such force that he toppled off the chaise lounge and onto the soft Arabian rug I had given ma mère for her 36th birthday. I sat upright and tidied my hair as he whined and writhed in pain, then grabbed my abandoned wine glass from the side table.

Tristan looked utterly betrayed and I giggled with intentionally cruelty.

"Miss Elle!" Dorota was standing at the front door again, shouting up the stairs. "Your godfather here for you!"

I offered Tristan an unapologetic smile and spilled the Crémant de Bourgogne over the crotch of his very tented trousers.

"If you'll excuse me, I have a _guest_ to attend to." Then, giddy with the adrenaline of our almost-encounter rushing through my veins, I cast a pointed look at the stain slowly spreading across the evidence that Tristan wanted _me_, and took a leaf out of Kathryn Merteuil's book.

"Down, boy."

I slid the sitting room doors shut behind me and gave my beloved godfather, Nate Archibald, a pearly white ladylike smile. He stood at the foot of the stairs, exactly where Tristan had stood, and looked quite surprised to see me there in front of him. A gift-wrapped package went back in his coat pocket immediately, and he turned to me with an equally large grin.

"Is that my present?" I bounced up and down like an eager child on Christmas morning, hoping that I could transform my residual sexual energy into completely kosher lunch conversation.

Nate rolled his eyes and started to hand the gift over, but a pale hand came to rest on his elbow and the manicured fingernails that dug into his Armani clad sleeve caused him to return the small, rectangular box to its hiding place. I clasped my hands anxiously behind my back, suddenly self-conscious of the glossy black polish that didn't suit my ultra-feminine ensemble.

"Mère," I whispered, and I desperately hoped Tristan had left the house through a side window. "I thought you..."

"Wouldn't be back until Tuesday?" she finished my sentence for me and removed her Chanel sunglasses. I felt the full scrutiny of her gaze. "Surprise. Is Dorota through with lunch yet? Nate hasn't eaten since Reims."

Before I could so much as formulate the thought that would lead to the words _I don't know_, the double doors I was leaning against slid open behind me and I felt Tristan's hand rest against my back to keep me upright. ...Of course he hadn't launched an epic escape. The very sound of my mother's voice would have driven him immediately to scheme every possible way he could make the rest of my day miserable. A quick glance over my shoulder at his gleaming eyes, and I knew the scheme was already underway.

"Ms. Waldorf," his hand pressed against my back and urged me forward. "Bienvenue. I hope you don't mind, but Elle invited me to join you."

I saw ma mère's mouth twitch with distaste – she really did not like Tristan, and for the first time in my life I thought that might be a good thing. She would order him to leave her sight at once, banish him from our home for all of eternity, and I would be able to sit on that chaise lounge again without feeling dirty.

She snapped the arms of her sunglasses closed and tucked them delicately into the pocket of her travel purse. I saw her feet move together and her chin lifted in a distinctly resolved way, and I knew that Society Mère had reared her ugly head; the way she brushed her expertly crafted chocolate curls over her silky shoulders told me I was in for an earful later. Then, her mouth bloomed like a blood red rose opening its bud to the sky, and I suddenly wished I hadn't kneed Tristan in the Marchand family jewels.

"Bien sûr."

I was a helpless girl condemned to a painful death, and the dining room table was to be my gallows.

* * *

**Translations:  
**_Courageux vieux_ - courageous old  
Non je ne dois pas partir - I do not have to leave  
Bienvenue - Welcome  
Bien sûr - Of course


	8. Poker Face

**A/N: **I apologize for the long stretch between updates! I was just in a play (Dial M for Murder, and it was spectacular!) at my college, and preparations for that plus the actual performances sucked up a lot of time. Happily, we had a power outage on this, the Saturday of my Spring Break, and I was able to sit in the dark for a few hours and type this beast up. A lot of information is revealed in this chapter, about some of the characters' situations and their children, etc, so I hope you enjoy that. Everything is slowly clicking into place, as far as the past goes. ;)

If you see any mistakes, please point them out.

xoxo

**CHAPTER EIGHT**_  
Poker Face_

My godfather linked arms with ma mère; I watched them amble down the hallway and studied the little moments that passed between them...because their friendship, which had always seemed so strong and platonic before, held new intimate depth in light of Gossip Girl's seemingly infinite archives. As I contemplated the personal way mère squeezed Nate's upper arm when he held the dining room door for her, Tristan snuck his hand under my elbow to steer me in that direction. I felt like a bicycle handlebar under his perfunctory grip, so I put the razor-sharp heels of my clunky white sandals to use and buried one of them in the center of his foot.

Nate turned in alarm when he heard Tristan's ungentlemanly yowl of agony.

I used the innocent smile I had perfected in my dressmaker's mirror to assure him that all was well. His skeptical look forced me to put my many years of dramatic training to use; I quickly slipped into what Dorota referred to as my Scary Convincing Oscar Winner Face. "We'll be along in a moment," I chirped, and I mimicked my mother in the way I fondly hugged Tristan's arm to my chest. "I just have to tell Tristan something important. Start without us!"

Nate raised his eyebrows in that way that told me he knew something was up, but that in his infinite grace and charity, he would let it slide. I couldn't help releasing a fond little laugh, because that facial expression had been more familiar to me on childhood trips to the Van der Bilt mansion – trips which practically always ended with the almost-destruction of numerous irreplaceable Archibald family heirlooms and, most memorably, the accidental burnings of several detested Van der Bilt hearth rugs. My reminiscent smile changed his Look into an equally warm, handsome little grin, and he disappeared with his trademark wink.

As he turned his back, I saw him in a tux and ma mère in a halo of white and silver, and that wink was victoriously delivered over her glossy brown curls as I clutched the stair railing in disbelief.

Tristan cursing under his breath made me blink, and the closing door led to a dining room, not a hotel room. I knew I had to find a way to get Nate on his own, so I could ask about that incident and the many others I had learned about since Gossip Girl joined the ranks of my 'most visited sites' list. But before I could talk to the one man who could put my mind at ease, I had to handle the one man I wanted to kick in the shins.

I turned on Tristan with a furious scowl and _did_ kick him in the shins.

"Are you trying to kill me, woman?" he hissed, now clutching his right foot _and_ its neighbor, The Now Spectacularly Bruised Shin. I watched his antics with a certain amount of amusement, because I had never seen him so thoroughly lose his composure.

"There will be no _trying_ if you ruin this lunch." I saw the beginnings of a sentence forming in the backs of his glinting, narrowed eyes, but I cut him off before his brain could so much as send the message to his lips. "And when I say there will be no trying, oui, I do mean I will _actually succeed_ in killing you. Tu comprends?"

The grimace on his indignant face told me oui, _il a compris_, and he would not contribute to any major hiccups that afternoon. But I saw something else – something like annoyance flickered across his brow, and it caught me off guard. Tristan had always told me I was the one person in his world he never grew tired of, and he had _never_ been irritated by me. By the valet or the chauffer or the doorman, or with his tie or his shoes or his father...but never _me_. The sight of his carefully maintained eyebrows chiseling grooves in the smooth, white easel of his forehead made my stomach turn over, and I did not like the way my heartbeat slowed.

It was _not_ fair that he had so much control over my emotions.

Against my better sense, I leaned up and gifted him a kiss on the lips. He returned it with biting enthusiasm. Literally.

"Did you bruise your lip?" ma mère asked as Tristan and I sat down across from her and Nate. They had indeed started without us, and Nate was already halfway through his first helping of Dorota's famous hors-d'oeuvres.

I poured myself a glass of water to avoid answering her question, then decided to guide the conversation in her direction.

_Waldorfs_, she had told me one night underneath my silk sheets, _always want to talk about themselves_. The glow from my slowly dying flashlight had illuminated her smile as she stroked my wild brown hair. _If you ever meet one who tells you otherwise, they're lying. Which Waldorfs also like to do, so there's probably an ulterior motive._

Perhaps that is why mère gave me a curious look when I asked how everything was in New York City. 'Why don't you want to talk about yourself? What's the ulterior motive?' she seemed to ask, but I ignored the silent inquiry and chalked the curious look up to the fact that I had never _been_ to Manhattan, therefore perhaps my curiosity seemed rather rootless.

"Lux says hello, and Jenny had me bring you a few pieces from her spring line." Mère nudged Nate in the ribs, which prompted him to reach into his coat pocket for the gift-wrapped box. "And this present is from _me_, Nate just wanted to take all the credit. It's one of the necklaces from her new jewelry venture."

I took the box and opened it a little apprehensively. I loved most of Aunt Jenny's ready-to-wear collection, but some of the clothes veered just a little too much in the _mall chic_ direction – I wasn't really a proponent of hot pink taffeta. Or taffeta, for that matter. Fortunately, the necklace in the expertly gift-wrapped box was practically a work of art. A rather modest link chain sprouted a bronze metal flower, the petals of which were made from a mixture of clear and pink crystals. The whole thing was held together by a delicate white silk ribbon.

"She's calling it _J_. Really, just _J_. I told her its a little kitsch, but you know she does what she wants."

"Yes," Nate's face stayed impassive, but his eyes lit up with a despondent smile. "I know."

I looked back and forth between ma mère and my godfather, and Gossip Girl's archives once more sprang to mind as I held Jenny's beautiful necklace in my hands. As far back as I could remember, even as far back as _before _I could remember, Nate and Jennifer Archibald had been madly in love with each other. Seeing them kiss and cuddle had, actually, disgusted me a little in my younger years. Mère, I had thought, was never so undignified as to attach her lips to someone and refuse to let go.

Of course, I finally knew better.

Once upon a time, _Nate and Blair_ had been the golden couple of Manhattan's younger society circles. Mère had been so undignified as to attach her lips to quite _a few_ handsome men and refuse to let go, my overly protective godfather included. Now, they were godparents to each other's children, and mère was very good friends with his fashion designer wife, a woman I had only ever known as the bright and bubbly blonde pixie who gave me free clothes and bought me expensive imported Swiss chocolates.

Of course, after that Google search, I knew better.

Jennifer Archibald had once been _Jenny Humphrey_, the ungrateful upstart who had ruined ma mère's life several times over. (I ignored the fact that mère had returned the favor, in kind, each and every time.)

I watched mère touch Nate's shoulder as she spoke of a little café on Park Avenue. Apparently it had meaning for them, because he put his fork down and chuckled before jumping into the tale with a few memories of his own. Nate had always been the man I pictured when I thought of heroic princes on valiant steeds. Sometimes, in my feverish five-year-old fantasies, I had even cast him as my gallant father, but of course, _I finally knew better_. He had hurt mère plenty of times throughout their relationship, and had even contemplated using her as a stepping stone for the sake of his family's fortune.

They smiled together and shared glasses of wine and bickered like siblings.

Nate flicked some bread at mère's face, and she stopped being venerable long enough to dig her spiked heel into his foot. Tristan nudged my knee with his underneath the table, no doubt trying to initiate a significant private glance, but I pretended not to feel his foot running up and down the length of my calf and reached for my glass of wine instead. I needed it.

"Of course, I was almost killed by a blind cab driver at 59th."

Nate nodded in understanding and popped set his fork down before mère could steal it and spear it through his hand. "I decided not to let Lux walk to school anymore. She pays about as little attention to the flashing red DON'T WALK signs as you do, and it would be a shame to explain to Queller why she can't do her homework from the ICU."

Mère ignored his quip about her observation skills – or perhaps just stored it away for future revenge– and made a displeased face. Her red lips turned down in their familiar frown, and then and _only _then was Blair Waldorf really home. "Our old headmistress," she explained to Tristan, upon noting his confused expression. "Eugh. The old bag is still hanging on for dear life, is she?"

"Unfortunately." Nate flashed his easy smile at Dorota when she entered the dining room pushing his favorite meal on her trusty silver cart. In unison, the four of us took the carefully folded napkins from our plates and draped them across our laps. Dorota bustled around us, cleaning up the hors-d'oeuvres and refilling our glasses as Nate relived several horror stories about Headmistress Queller.

"...and basically expelled me before the whole thing was sorted out. She really doesn't like Lux, especially since she likes to break the dress code now and then with a few daring fashion innovations."

Dorota loaded the dirty dishes onto the second level of her cart, and then picked up Nate's plate of steaming vegetables and lean meat. Our finest china had been pulled from the top cupboards for the very special lunch, and our faithful maid had spared no ingredients for the sake of practicality; the presentation was absolutely exquisite. Even the flowers at the center of the table seemed to be more artfully arranged than ever before, even with the belladonna lilies' bent stems. Debussy played faintly over the camouflaged Bose speakers.

"Oh, I approve," ma mère sighed mournfully, dusted an imaginary speck of dirt from the cuff of her shirt, and let her long hair fall perfectly over her silk-covered shoulders. I wondered if it was an invisible movement of her head that allowed her such control over her curls, or if it was just that her hair loved her more than mine could ever love me. I fingered my bobcat haircut a little miserably. "Last I heard from Serena, Constance has turned into an utter fashion wasteland. You'll find more style on a pack of Chapin girls, with all the regulations Queller has clamped down on."

Nate moved his half-empty wine glass out of Dorota's way and continued his description as he sipped. "She hands out detention at the drop of a hat, and for the most insignificant things. Lux is doing little community service projects every other week, it seems like. Plus, she has a nasty vendetta against Teddy because Chuck – "

There was a hideous clatter as the fine porcelain fell to the floor and shattered. Ma mère spilled her glass over the antique tablecloth.

Nate froze with his own glass halfway to his lips, as if a witch had cast a spell on him and made him into stone. I saw a shudder go through Dorota, it appeared almost tangibly in the form of a tightly wound wire that passed through her spine and caused her back to stiffen, her pupils to dilate, her lips to fall open in surprise. And there was the most horrible silence in ma mère's eyes, the kind that brought to mind down turned lips her the vanity mirror as I reverently brushed chestnut tresses. Tristan's heel stopped caressing my leg.

Dorota was the first to move, and she hit the ground, knees first, apologies spewing from her mouth in fragmented Polish. Before I could assure her that it was no trouble at all, that there was more china in the cabinets, that Nate could have Tristan's plate and Tristan could just leave and never come back, the frazzled woman collected the broken pieces of porcelain and left the room with the haste of a very restless cheetah.

Then ma mère stood and blotted at the spreading wine stain with her napkin.

Nate swallowed, set his glass down beside the half-empty bread basket, and excused himself.

I spared less than half a glance in Tristan's direction before I flew out of my seat and followed my godfather into the hallway.

"Chuck," I breathed, with some kind of religious fervor. He had said _Chuck_. I did not really know, until I heard that name from someone else's lips, how desperate I was for it. I wanted to know, I _had_ to know everything that had happened between him and ma mère after high school, and I had to know the answers to all the unanswered questions in the archives of Gossip Girl's blog. I had to know how late Chuck liked to sleep in, where he preferred to spend his summers, if he liked to celebrate Christmas at home with family or abroad in total anonymity. Did he like his job? Did he drink his coffee black or with sugar and cream? Did he even make his own coffee or did he have a staff of highly qualified coffee connoisseurs to do that for him?

Was he ever, _ever_, for a fraction of an instant in love with ma mère?

Was he my...father?

Nate stood in front of a garden-facing window, the sharp cut of his suit defined elegantly in the misty grey Sunday afternoon. One hand supported his weight on the windowsill, and the other was tucked into his pocket in the shape of a very livid fist. I watched the ragged rise and fall of his back as he struggled to keep himself from punching anything exceedingly expensive, as he was wont to do whenever he let rage control his actions. I felt afraid for the pretty Italian vase on the sill beside him.

"Nate?" I ventured, walking the few steps to the window and perching on the seat beside it.

"Ellie," he responded, moving away from the window and raking his free hand through his hair. I noticed how thin it was at the top, as if he had run his fingers through it a little too often, and wondered for the first time why Jenny wasn't staying with him at the Van der Bilt mansion. The urge to give him a big bear hug was overridden only by my desire to find out, finally and utterly, who Chuck Bass was and why I so desperately cared. "You should go back in there, see if your mom needs anything..."

"She's fine." I shook my head. "But I'm not."

His head snapped up and suddenly, those frustrated eyes were focused on me and his fist unfurled itself in his pocket. "What's the matter?" He looked almost desperate to grasp at something that had nothing to do with his slip in the dining room. "It's not that boy in there, is it? I can kick him out."

Had Nate suggested that ten minutes earlier, I would have nodded ecstatically and requested Tristan be _thrown_ out instead, aggressively enough that he landed right on his stupid, smug backside. But the phantom tension from the dining room stiffened my shoulders and made me shake my head again, so that the ends of my hair dangled over my shoulders and made me look as wounded and dejected as possible – I needed him to focus on me and my plight, after all, not fret over ma mère and whatever hollow emotions she might have felt at the mere mention of Chuck Bass's name. My emotions upon hearing it, after all, were so white hot and frantic that nothing she had ever felt could possibly leave her as untethered.

"What is it, then?" Nate was at my side, squatting down by the window and looking at me with a puckered brow.

My breath shook my entire body, and I wasn't even acting. "That name you said in there..."

He was up again, and he was pacing. His fingers massaged his scalp in experienced circles, because they had tread that path countless times before, and his feet moved with just as much purpose as they did when his steps led to a destination. "It was stupid, Ellie. I forgot who I was talking t – " He stopped with his back to me, but there was a restless energy in his stance, and the stress in his sagging shoulders made me slip up off the chair to stand behind him.

"And I almost forgot who I was talking to again." I heard the way his lips quirked and saw the rush of questions on his face, even before he slowly revolved on his heel. A strand of hair fell over his eyes and cast a dark shadow on his eyelids, and I automatically clasped my hands in front of me in a childhood reflex designed to make me look as guiltless as possible. "What does that name mean to you?"

There were a thousand different ways I could have answered that question, and for every thousandth way there was a different emotion I could have conveyed. 'Maybe I would know if anyone ever trusted me with the truth!' with a petulant stamp of the foot as I crumpled my face in a wounded cry of anguish. 'That's what I want you to tell me, right now,' as I sat back down in the chair with a calm air of already-knowing.

I chose "I don't know," and let my shoulders rise and fall in a silent sigh. "But I've been waiting ten years to find out."

The imaginary witch from earlier worked her magic and Nate turned back into the godfather I knew. He pushed his hair out of his eyes so I could see every square inch of his open, honest face, and his shoulders broadened as he leaned against the wall and stared at me in disbelief. I could see that he was trying to catalogue every time he had seen me in that time frame, so he could add this startling revelation to his perspective – _Elle knew about Chuck when we took her horseback riding at the vineyard, Elle knew about Chuck when we all spent Easter at __Les Trois Vallées, Elle knew about Chuck when we were __trying so hard not to bring him up in casual conversation__!_

I let him process the knowledge for a minute or so before I spoke up. The dining room door was closed, and I could hear the voices of Dorota, ma mère, and Tristan as they tried to converse about anything and everything that had nothing to do with New York or Chuck Bass, the only two things I could imagine caring about just then. "I read about him in ma mère's diary. I...found it in papère's library when I was six, and ever since then, I've carried this picture around."

I withdrew my treasured photograph from the stylish pocket of my purple dress, and held it out for Nate to take.

"And I've always wondered who he is and why they look so happy, and..."

His fingers closed around the edges of the picture, and something about the way his mouth turned just so at the right corner made him look like the seventeen year old boy I had seen on Gossip Girl. Com. His hair fell in his eyes with a little more grace, his shoulders _dropped_ rather than sagged, and one of his hips cocked so that his stance was just a little bit uneven. I felt like I was standing in the hallway with one of my own delinquent youth, rather than with an upstanding citizen in his late 30s to whom the word 'rebellion' probably meant a group of office aides stealing staplers.

"What?"

Nate's eyes met mine and he grinned so broadly I thought his face might split and crack. He would really look like a statue of a Greek god then, I silently mused as I watched the grey light from the window flicker in his suddenly bright eyes, with trenches and imperfections in his Armani-clad marble.

"I took this picture."

Everything I had ever wondered about that picture, every scenario I had ever invented, every back-story I had ever assigned to explain the wonderful looks of content happiness on their beautiful young faces...I saw everything flit away in the presence of what had to be the forthcoming truth. My mouth went dry and I literally felt my heart speed up and skip a beat, the way I had read about in most of my harlequin romance novels. Only, the heartache I was about to be cured of had nothing to do with_ my_ handsome prince or with _my_ sweeping and epic romance. It had everything to do with my past, though, and my present...and my future.

"Have you...talked to your mom about...?" Nate knew the Waldorf women well enough to answer that question on his own. "Maybe you should..."

"No, please," I didn't like to interrupt him, but I couldn't let him refuse me. Not when I was so close to the whole story. "Please, I need to know about...everything."

Nate looked up from the picture and studied my face for a moment that lasted seemed to last forever; I thought lunch must have been over by the time he finally spoke.

"I can't," he said, and he pressed the picture back into my hands and stood tall and broad-shouldered again. "I'm sorry, Elle belle, but it's between you and your mom."

"But she'll never tell me!" I protested, trying to grab onto one of his hands. He moved towards the closed dining room door and shook his head a bit regretfully.

"I'm sorry. You'll have to ask her."

He turned the door handle, but stopped to look at me before he rejoined the party inside. I didn't even have to dig up one of my Scary Convincing Oscar Winner Faces, because I knew the pleading expression I wore was as real and desperate as any genuinely heartbroken woman had ever made upon having her most cherished dream shattered.

But...there was something in the way Nate's knuckles whitened around the doorknob that gave me a flicker of hope. Maybe he wouldn't tell me that day, or the next. Maybe he would keep insisting I ask ma mère for information, even when we both knew I would never get it that way. Maybe I had to give him some time to adjust to my request – when he really thought about it and realized the importance of what he could tell me, he would call me up and spill everything.

He had to, because I didn't have anything else to hope for.

I waited until Nate had been gone for several minutes before I retreated to the kitchen stairs and took refuge in my dark, quiet bedroom. I avoided touching the light switch and went straight to my perfectly made-up bed, where I tore the happy yellow headband from behind my ears because it was giving me a headache, shoved the pristinely white sandals off of my feet because they were making my toes hurt, and pushed the patterned black tights down over my thighs and knees and kicked them into a crumpled pile under my bedside table. The photograph was a wrinkled, fading mess between my shaking fingers when I finally realized I was still holding it.

The pillows cushioned my back as inconspicuously as clouds, and I unfolded the picture in the same way I always did. Up, and to the left, and suddenly ma mère's face was no longer smooth and perfect, but creased down the sides, and Chuck's smile was as crinkled and hazy as a desert mirage.

Everything I needed to know about myself was fading as quickly as the two blissful people beaming up at me from that crumpled photograph.

* * *

**Translations:  
**Tu comprends? - Do you understand?  
_il a compris - _he understood


	9. Muscle Museum

**A/N:** So, first of all, HUGE THANKS to **Savage2a**, who performed a triple bypass on my atrocious French. =] Also, I can't believe I'm on chapter nine! Ah! It's exciting. I know these last few chapters have been rather exposition-y, but I promise everything is going to boil over soon. Finally, this chapter goes out to **Blood Red Kiss of Death** – no mention of NJ _whatsoever_. ;) (And thanks for the entertaining review!)

PS, join my fan fiction community on proboards to read deleted material and view graphic art from this and future stories. The link is on my profile.

This chapter shares its name with an excellent Muse song. Chapter seven was named for Lady GaGa's Poker Face. =]

xoxo

**CHAPTER NINE**_  
Muscle Museum_

The way the door handle jiggled just slightly as it turned made me suspect Tristan had decided to join me. When the door stopped just shy of the point that made its hinges creak, I _knew_ he had decided to join me. Rather than sitting up and giving him an inviting stare, however, I stayed curled up on the pillows with my back to the rest of the room. The picture was underneath my head, cradled between silk charmeuse and 1000 thread count Egyptian cotton. I clutched my knees to my chest in its place.

"Ça va?"

His form caught the light of my floor lamp, and its light cast his shadow on the wall in front of me. I imagined, with the same desperate childishness I had felt before Nate refused to answer any of my questions, that he was Peter Pan and I was Wendy, and that the Neverland wasn't terribly far away.

"Oui, je vais bien."

I knew he heard the lie in my voice, and I also knew he was not blind. My mattress sank a bit under his weight, and I felt the warmth from his beautifully large right hand when he reached over to push my bangs out of my eyes.

"Oui," he whispered, and I saw his shadow shake its head in doubt. "_Of course you're all right_."

And then his lips were on my neck, smooth and warm, and his kisses left a hot trail of combustible pixie dust down to my shoulder, and I regretted every second I wasted wishing he would leave. The light that riddled through the windowpanes weakened and dimmed like any sound that wasn't the symphony of our heavy breathing as he rolled me over and dutifully brushed his rough palms across my sodden cheeks. The gentle rhythm also rubbed away all thoughts of Nate and the diary and ma mère's unwavering silence, and I closed my eyes at the familiar feeling of his torso pressed against my hips.

"Tristan," I mumbled, and my fingers scratched his scalp of their own volition.

"Elle," he replied, unbuttoning my dress so my delicate La Perla bra lace shimmered in the dim light.

I let him undress me, and didn't even protest when he picked me up and carried me to the bathroom, set me in the cold cradle of my clawfoot bathtub, and turned the faucet so that piping hot water sent waves of steam rushing over my parched skin. I did, however, give him an arched eyebrow when he shed his own clothes and stepped into the tub with me.

"Ta maman et Monsieur Archibald went out to the garden," he explained, and I let him pull me back to his chest.

My eyes drifted closed and our breathing slowed to harmonize in time.

The thing I liked most about Tristan was he didn't ask irritating questions – which was my number one reasoning for dismissing 'minions', but that can be discussed at length later – or try to inject himself into every aspect of my life. He understood what I understood and what no one else seemed able to comprehend: some matters are so private that they warrant no discussion, past the polite pleasantries we had already exchanged. I had told him I was all right, and he was bathing with me because he enjoyed my company, not because he was trying to take care of me.

I turned over and let my hands fall against the flushed skin on his chest. He looked down at me with his dazzling eyes and rascally smirk, and I giggled when I took his lower lip between my teeth. We spent a few minutes twisting around in the water, splashing tidal waves over the porcelain edges as we stretched over and under each other in ways we had never done before.

"This is silly," I hummed (as I nuzzled my nose into the crook of his neck anyway). "_Très bête_...I know you hate baths."

"Oui, c'est vrai. I do." I smiled and felt him do the same as he pressed a careless kiss to my temple. "You look like a drowned rat."

I poked him hard in his ribs. "Oh, that's nice. Cochon..."

"_You love it,_" he just grinned and let his hands wander down my back, over my hips, across my backside. "_You_ _know you do._"

"Non!" I protested immediately, slapping his hand away and scurrying to the other side of the bathtub. "Je ne sais pas de quoi tu parles."

I watched him towel off some fifteen minutes later, and laughed when he asked if he could use my hair dryer. We spent the rest of that gloomy afternoon holed up on my balcony, where we could admire the activity in the Jardins du Trocadéro while we gossiped shamelessly about every jansonien we could not stand.

"She's a slut," Tristan confirmed of Lisette Lémieux, an incurably dense girl we had been discussing at length. I had no doubt he knew her reputation firsthand, and the thought of her wavy blonde hair and kilometer-long legs brought Sophie's little black dress and Manolo Blahniks to my mind's eye.

"_And what about Sophie?_" I let my voice tumble past my teeth with the bored flair I was famous for, but I knew the tense pull of my face gave me away.

Tristan leaned against the railing, looking the epitome of bored flair, and let his used cigarette fall to the concrete below. "Et bien quoi?"

I crossed my arms and frowned thoughtfully at the foggy grey hulk of la tour Eiffel. _What about her_ _indeed_, I thought to myself and mental pictures of the two of them flourished in front of me like film on a reel. Them laughing, their arms wrapped around each other, flowers twisting and bending beneath their tangled legs and nude backs. Their fingers caressed each other's stomachs, their eyelashes fluttered together, their lips entwined and unfastened and made way for desperate tongues...

It was everything I knew he had done with numerous other girls. But that he did it with _her_, two houses away, whether she was a virgin or not, when I was so nearby and so willing to do those things with him...the idea of them turning together as we had turned in the bathtub... It all made my gut churn.

"_What about her?_" he repeated, and I looked back to his dark silhouette where it dug a hole in the milk white sky.

"Did you really sleep with her just to make her look bad?"

"Why else would I sleep with her?" The grin on his face was supposed to put me at ease, but my stomach stirred warningly.

"Because you like her?" My suggestion made him snicker, so I went another route. "Or you don't like me."

That stopped his laughter – it wiped every trace of it from his face. Before I could so much as draw breath for a new sentence, he was in the chair next to mine, crossing one leg over the other knee and shaking his head. He tried to take my hands in his, but I kept my arms pinned in front of my chest.

"_You know I do._"

"Comment pourrais-je le savoir?" The wind picked up and brought with it the cologne of impending rain. "_You don't show it._"

"_Have you talked to her?_" Tristan's tone changed ever so slightly; I heard the vexed tone in his lower register. "_What did she say?_"

Sophie had sent me a text message the evening before, but I had deleted it without thinking. Before that, my last two-way communication with her had been on Saturday, during the unwanted, excruciatingly graphic conversation about her 'first time' with Tristan. It wasn't until I met him at our chestnut tree on Avenue Foch later that night that I learned their intimacy had _supposedly_ been a ploy to ruin her reputation.

'Supposedly' being the operative word. Because Tristan and I had cooked up some elaborate schemes in our time as allies, but nothing so _involved_ (for lack of a better word) had ever been necessary before. And just why _did_ he want to ruin her reputation when no one had a vendetta against her? My only issue with her, at that moment, was that she had won our bet fair and square and according to our pre-set terms, I had to lose my virginity to whomever she selected. No matter whom he was. Whether I liked him or not.

A little shudder slid down my spine...I had been _so sure_ I would win the bet, that I hadn't even bothered to include a clever loophole like mère and papère and grandmamma and saba and basically the entire Waldorf-Rose clan had always taught me.

_Never enter into a binding contract without a knife._ Upon my confused expression, they always added. _The knife is for cutting the ropes, Ellie._

I was a disgrace to my entire immediate _and_ extended family.

Tristan must have read into the pathetic range of ineptly concealed emotions on my face, because he chuckled in that irritating the-world-is-mine-to-command way and managed to pry one of my hands into his. I made a mental note to practice my poker face in the mirror, because the ability to call upon it had clearly failed me.

"I knew about the bet and I wanted you to win, _ma petite_." His hand tickled mine for a moment before he laced our fingers together.

"So you...slept with Sophie." At least my flat deadpan hadn't eluded me. I employed it and then rolled my eyes. "Right, that makes sense."

"It would if you would shut up and let me explain." He put his free hand over my mouth and merely smirked suggestively when I sank my teeth into his palm. "I slept with Sophie because my plan is brilliant...nigh legendary. You see, _I_ knew she wasn't a virgin because Leon and Dave have _both_ been sleeping with her for months – yes, Evie knew about it."

That was definitely news to me, and I was under the impression I knew absolutely _everything _about my classmates' secret trysts and illicit affairs. Eve and David had been an item since our third year of collège and I had a hard time believing that she would consciously tolerate months of unfaithfulness.

"They wanted to spice things up," Tristan shrugged, and I shrugged too and nodded for him to move on. 'To each their own', after all. "De toute façon, they've been telling me about it ever since it started, and that was how we realized she was trying to keep both of them in the dark. Do you know what I'm saying?"

"Oui," I shut my eyes and let a few early drops of rain splash against my face. It all made sense now, with just those few words... Sophie had been busier than usual since the end of summer, and none of her excuses had ever really added up. First of all, I knew she had quit ballet when we were 11, so her quick explanations about Madame Utkin were laughably implausible. But even those were slightly more plausible than her many claims she had 'been out' with her mama...the next time I saw them exchange non-hateful eye contact where _anyone_ could see, I would hand Tristan over with a sunny smile and a jaunty 'Have fun, kids!'

Fortunately, it looked like I would _never_ have to face that particular nightmare.

"She was sleeping with them at the same time, but telling Dave that he was the only one she was seeing...and she was telling Leon the same thing." I shook my head and looked up at him. "_Sophie_ did that? Really? I never knew she was that devious."

Tristan nodded and laid his head on top of mine. "Oui, vraiment. _Leon was really pissed. You know how he gets. But Dave thought the whole thing was really funny, and wanted to try and trick her into arranging to meet both of them at the same time, just to catch her in the act and knock her down a peg._"

"_That would have been _très drôle_..._" One part of me _did_ think it sounded cruel, but it was the other, louder, audible-by-other-humans that part giggled and thought it would have been hilarious. We weren't called Les Misérables because we made _other_ people miserable, after all; most of our best plots and practical jokes were meant to keep our group on its toes. "_Why_ _didn't you do it?_"

"_Because_," his sharp teeth glinted even in the grim, hazy light. "_We heard about your little bet and planned something better._"

And before the clouds could spit out their rain, Tristan laid out the whole scheme he had cooked up with David and Leon. The three of them had agreed early on that Tristan could not simply bed me and leave Sophie's punishment to the cosmos. "_That would be too quick and not nearly as satisfying. No offense, ma petite._"

Instead, they had decided to twist our straightforward bet to their advantage. Tristan _would_ sleep with Sophie, and Sophie would appear to have been deflowered in Vivienne Marchand's cymbidium orchids, a fact which she would surely share with me at the first opportunity. When I asked why they hadn't just let me in on the idea from the start, Tristan tightened his grip on my hand and kissed the backs of my knuckles with a fond sigh.

"You wouldn't have been able to resist telling her everything. Don't you remember last year? Arielle et Professeur Moreau?"

"That's not fair," I grumbled, turning my face away from his advancing lips. "That one was really juicy..."

"De _toute_ façon," he pressed a kiss to my cheek anyway. "We wanted this one to explode in front of everyone, tomorrow morning..."

The following day was Monday, and Janson's front steps would be besieged by large clusters of students catching up on a weekend's worth of gossip – who had kissed who, what everyone had done, where had Les Misérables been all Saturday, when would the next homework assignment be due because so-and-so hadn't done the last one and they really needed to get their grades up, why was Lisette Lémieux prancing around in those tacky fake Prada shoes again (and why did she ever think they went with anything?), how long would it be until the next holiday? Et cetera, et cetera, and all punctuated with giggly text messages and silent glances shared over clueless people's heads.

In the midst of that beginning-of-the-week chaos, Tristan, David, and Leon would lead Sophie to the center of the steps and reveal everything they knew about her sordid sex life. When she tried to sputter an explanation, they would tell her that she was clearly a liar; therefore anything she said from then on would be doubted or taken as a desperate grasp at attention. When I walked up and she tried to convince me she was telling the truth, I would coldly tell her the lie Tristan had suggested on Avenue Foch – of course she wasn't with him on Friday night, because he spent the whole weekend with me.

"That way, not only does everyone think she lied to win the bet, but everyone knows about her tête-à-têtes avec Dave et Leon."

We hid under my bedcovers when the mist finally fell over our heads. I could hear ma mère talking to Nate in the room below, and the distant clatter of dishes in the kitchen meant Dorota had already begun preparing dinner. My stomach rumbled as my brain tried to process the information overload. Sophie had been lying to me and Dave and Leon for months, and Tristan had only slept with her to ensure a certain amount of bitter 'this is what happens when you lie, Pinocchio' medicine to her punishment.

I would be Lycée Janson de Sailly's undisputed queen until I left for Conservatoire National Supérieur d'Art Dramatique. Sophie would fade into obscurity, unless I deigned to show her some charity, in which case I would look like the gracious and forgiving angel to her reticent and ruthless devil. I would not only _not_ lose the bet, but I was free to lose my virginity to the only boy I had _ever_ considered worthy of the honor.

_And_, as an extra shiny bonus, our relationship would be the toast of Parisian society! What could be more colossal than a union between the Marchands and the Waldorfs? My picture would be the top of every society page, both the reputable ones and the sweaty backroom publications. People on the street would stop to ask what I was wearing, and I would see the same expensive shoes on every pair of feet up and down Champs-Élysées. Retired society matrons would ask me to host their fundraisers, attend their charity balls, date their eligible grandsons.

_Oh, now Jackie! You know I'm taken. Stop trying to pawn me off on your many dashing entitled grandchildren..._

"_It sounds perfect_..." I smiled into Tristan's chest and wrapped my left leg around his hip. "What if it's too good to be true?"

"Pour toi?" His fingers progressed from my hand to the underside of my bare thigh. "Nothing is too good."

"_You're lying to get under my skirt._" I teased his collarbone with a few well placed butterfly kisses.

"_Since when do I have to do anything other than get under your skirt to get under your skirt?_"

We wound up in a familiar position: the sheets in jumbled disarray at our feet, his lips smoothing the gooseflesh on my inner thighs, my fingers grasping at silk charmeuse pillows and feather light dark hair. It was almost like we had been doing it for years, so easily did my toes curl when his tongue darted and turned and pushed my buttons. In that bedroom on that rainy day, I knew with frightening sureness that my entire life was only a few hours away from changing. Before the first class bell even rang the next day, everyone would see me differently.

Everything would change.

I just hoped my wardrobe could handle it.

**  
Translations:**  
Ça va? – Are you all right?  
Oui, je vais bien. – Yes. I am fine.  
Très bête – Very silly  
Oui, c'est vrai. – Yes, that is true.  
Cochon – Pig  
Je ne sais pas de quoi tu parles. – I don't know what you're talking about.  
Et bien quoi? – What about her?  
Comment pourrais-je le savoir? – How do I know?  
De toute façon – Anyway  
Vraiment – really  
Très drôle – very funny


	10. An Interlude: A Well Respected Man

**CHAPTER TEN**  
_A Well Respected Man_

It was with great reluctance that he pulled himself out of bed that dazzlingly beautiful morning, stepped into the slippers the butler had set in front of his bedside table, and trudged the backbreaking fifteen steps it took to get him into the cool darkness of his private bathroom. He made a mental note to remind someone, for the twentieth time, that opening all of the curtains as soon as the sun came up was not the best way to rouse him, even when he wasn't severely hung over.

A steaming cup of hot coffee was waiting for him next to the already running shower, and he sent a silent thank you to the God he didn't believe in before downing the entire mug in one fearless gulp. It had been a very, very long night.

An hour later, after his preferred breakfast of Belgian waffles, eggs Benedict, crunchy-but-not-burned toast topped with his favorite impossible to find mixed fruit jelly and real butter (because he didn't believe in I Can't Believe It's Not Butter, because if it wasn't butter – what was it and why exactly was he expected to eat it?), very slightly pulpy orange juice, and two Marlboro Reds, he knotted his thin striped tie into a half-Windsor and strode toward the elevator with the _New York Times_ folded under his arm.

Every day, en route to the place he personally referred to as hell on earth, he sunk into the luxurious leather seats of his black limousine, unfurled the freshly printed newspaper, and perused the business section. At precisely the same time every morning, he arrived in front of the imposing building, tossed the pages aside, and leapt from the backseat before his driver even had a chance to kill the ignition.

That morning, he wore sunglasses to block the unseasonably bright sun from his dark eyes. It flashed snide blinding bursts in the reflection of every Manhattan skyscraper, and penetrated even his limo's almost black windows. The migraine that neither gritty coffee nor the usual Marlboros could fix still pounded in that little niche behind his eyes.

It made reading the paper impossible, certainly, and secretly he was relieved. Reading the paper made him feel like his father, and he knew he was not his father, no matter how many sharp suits he wore with impeccably polished shoes and hideously expensive platinum Cartier watches – he could never pull off that effortless business polish. It was no use to play dress up and pretend he was something he wasn't.

Overcome by exhaustion that had nothing to do with his hangover, he swept both hands through his neatly combed hair, plowing through all the maintenance work he had done in front of the bathroom mirror and turning the dark tufts into an unruly mop. If he looked like hell when he walked through the front doors, well...he would walk through the front doors looking like hell.

What were they going to do, kick him out of the building?

Yes, he would get a few arched eyebrows from well-known acquaintances, and perhaps some of the higher-ups would give him appraising looks, but they couldn't oust him when he had so ardently earned his place above them...they could whisper all they wanted about one morning's unkempt appearance. He would exact some subtle revenge on them later for further ruining his morning.

God, he should have had a coffee maker installed in the limo.

"Clint," he called to the front seat. (He honestly didn't know the man's name. He'd never thought to ask.) "Pull over. I need coffee."

"Where to, sir?" came his newest chauffeur's voice over the intercom.

"Pick a street corner and get me something black. And none of that VIA Ready Brew shit. Italian roast."

"They didn't have it last time, sir..."

"Then tell them Bass Industries is thinking of expanding to include faux Italian espresso bars that market atmosphere and provide none – just overpriced occasionally halfway-decent cups of coffee and other assorted food stuffs that have nothing to do with – " He massaged the spot above his nose to relieve the tiny psychotic man with the jackhammer that seemed to have taken up residence in his nasal cavity. Hadn't he told Cliff not to get him on his Starbucks tangent before noon? Someone needed to give him that memo before he was fired for it. "Just get me something strong and ancient. I want to taste the grounds."

Fifteen minutes and one near hostile takeover later, the limousine was once more slithering its way through New York City traffic.

The street signs crawled by...

79th...

80th...

81st...

82nd...

83rd...

84th...

At long last – or all too soon, as he hadn't yet touched his piping Italian roast – they arrived. The usual crowd was gathered by the curb, the same infernal crowd that made every morning trek to the front doors an expedition to rival Odysseus's. With an irritated sigh, he looped his favorite silk scarf around his neck, picked up the coffee he'd just had to have but no longer wanted, and opened the door before the engine stopped thrumming beneath his feet.

The crowd turned their chattering mouths in his direction, and a few hands went up in friendly waves and invitations for him to join them around the proverbial water cooler. He shrugged them off before mechanically sidestepping an old woman walking her seven dogs, the young mother pushing a baby carriage behind her, and an inescapable gaggle of immaculately dressed females in five-story-tall high heels.

Before he could brave the gates and make his way up the front steps to the building's imposing entrance, there was a tap on his shoulder.

Clark was standing right behind him, his hat tipped jauntily on his head.

"Almost forgot your things, sir." The chauffeur held out the oft-forgotten bag, and then traded it for the untouched cup of coffee.

"Thanks, Clint." The load of undone work weighed his right shoulder down and made it almost impossible to stand upright.

"Have a good day, Mr. Bass."

At the sharp look the boy created just by knitting together his dark eyebrows, Clyde hastily cleared his throat and amended.

"My apologies, sir – Teddy."

Teddy Bass nodded and resumed his quest for the elusive front doors. Before he got any farther than three more steps, however, a hand darted out from beside the grand front stairs and yanked him into the shadows.

His morning really _was_ turning into an odyssey. Luckily, the sight that met him wasn't an irritated Cyclops or a peckish cannibal out for an easy morning snack or a deserted isle populated by sea nymphs – maybe he should have kept that coffee to strengthen his obviously waning manhood, if he was glad that anything he saw _wasn't_ a deserted isle far from civilization populated by lonely sea nymphs who _never wanted him to leave_ – but the closest thing he had to a best friend. And he was holding something rather peculiar.

Slowly curling smoke tendrils wafted under Teddy's nose, and he looked from the half-smoked joint to Lex Archibald with a skeptical frown. He usually waited until lunch to smoke _tobacco_, much less pot. Part of Teddy wondered if something particularly traumatizing had happened since their drinking binge the night before, or if the marijuana was just to cure the ungodly after-effects of all that tequila.

_Tequila_. It couldn't have been scotch or whiskey or anything remotely respectable. It had to be _tequila_.

Teddy _hated_ tequila.

But, it _had_ done the trick. He could only barely remember the reason he had started drinking in the first place, and...well, if the pot could make it an even more distant memory, he would accept the bleary eyes and completely inefficient 2 hours. Lex, apparently, felt the same way, because he took one last hit of the hand-rolled cigarette before he passed it on to Teddy.

"It was stupid of me," he was grumbling, apparently not so far removed from his unfortunate memory. "I should have known..."

"You can't blame yourself." Teddy shut his eyes and let the smoke flood his senses. "After all, she didn't knock."

Lex muttered something about him having missed the point entirely, but Teddy was tired of hearing about the sordid experience. Yes, he cared that Lex was going through a bit of a family crisis, and yes, he appreciated the fact that he would probably never again be able to look his mother in the eye, but he had his _own_ issues to worry about. And at least Lex _had_ a mother whose eyes he could forever avoid – all Teddy had was his butler, an ever-changing lineup of incompetent limousine drivers, and a father who treated him like he was an amalgamation of Lucifer and Carter Baizen, if the two of them had been involved in a sordid love affair which resulted in the birth of the entire board of trustees at Bass Industries, who then made a goat sacrifice in order to bring back the spirit of Bartholomew Bass.

His father was on business in Tokyo, and had been for three months. ...And would likely be for another three. It was cool because he got the entire place to himself, but it was entirely lame because he didn't have anything to do with it. He wasn't much of a swinging bachelor, and the only parties he enjoyed throwing were ones that ended in cake and presents. Lex came over for video games and a place to crash when he was too toasted to go home, but other than that...it was pretty deserted.

He didn't even have a pretty girl to invite over.

A flash of red caught his eye, and Teddy realized he was stoned when he started giving names to all of the different shades of red (persimmon, rust, scarlet) and orange (mahogany, gamboges, tangerine, pumpkin) that caught the light where the sun hit the top of her head. He was very glad for the sunglasses because they made the halo around her less intense, and he loved the pot because it made it _not_ humiliating to set eyes on her. In fact, it simulated all of the good things about staring at her – all the things he had feared were lost after his utter stupidity the night before.

Lex shook his head about something Teddy had not heard, and soon the still smoking cigarette was underneath the blond's designer heel. Teddy watched it crumble into the pavement, and wondered if perhaps there were better ways to dispose of perfectly rolled joints... the unwelcome thought of pondering that one thought too much, however, drove his thoughts back to the vibrant crimson angel in the middle of the front courtyard, and he thought if he could just think a bit less about her and her stupid hair he could think a lot more clearly.

But that could have been the cannabis thinking out loud.

"When does your dad get back?" he asked, grappling for something that had nothing to do with her long limbs or pouty red lips.

"Huh?" Lex leaned against the wall and put his hands in his pockets. "Oh...tonight, actually. He's bringing a house guest."

"That's weird." Teddy lifted the sunglasses off the bridge of his nose and felt completely sober for a moment. "A house guest from France?"

"Mais oui," was Lex's dry response. "My godsister."

"You have a godsister? From France?" France was oddly fascinating to him for some reason, but he couldn't _quite_ put his finger on it. Or his mind, because it was uninteresting as quickly as it was enthralling. Then again, they did have a vast array of cheeses, and Teddy _did_ enjoy a good ham and cheese sandwich. He wondered fleetingly if it was lunch yet, because he could _really_ go for a ham and cheese sandwich and some pad khing. "And she's coming here? From France?"

"Yes, and I'm sure the pilot is from France too, if that matters?"

The warning bell tolled from inside the school, and a unanimous clickity-clack of expensive high heels drowned it out not two seconds later.

"Constance girls on the move," Lex unnecessarily assured him. "I'm sure she'll be gone soon and then you can show your sorry face."

"Wow." Teddy deadpanned, glad that being stoned hadn't robbed him of the ability to employ the expression. "Thanks a lot, and was the joint to soften that critical verbal blow?"

Lex smirked and slung his own leather book bag over his shoulders. "The joint was to soften the embarrassment. For _me_. Because I have to be seen with you."

A little beast tickled the insides of Teddy's stomach. The beast was something like an imaginary miniature dragon that had been there between his intestines for a few years, and he referred to this beast as his Inner Dad – it chimed in sometimes, not with words, but with spurts of fire. Mostly, Teddy had decided that the fire meant 'be a Bass, you horrible representative of the male gender', but he couldn't be entirely sure. There was always the chance it was just gas.

The last time the beast had roared in his guts had been the night before at a birthday party for one of St. Jude's lacrosse players or one of Constance Billard's committee chair people, he couldn't really remember – all he knew was that it had been in TriBeCa at 11 pm, and at 1 am he had approached Scarlett, and at 1:02 am he had spilled his drink all over her flattering gold dress, and he hadn't been able to live with himself ever since. It was a terrible burden to bear, knowing he'd utterly fucked things up with the only girl:

**1. Who had ever given him the time of day  
2. He had ever been interested enough in to approach  
3. Who had ever smiled at him because he said something thoughtful, not because he was a Bass  
4. He had ever seriously thought about losing his virginity to**

That list was scribbled on a piece of notebook paper he had stuck in his pants the night before.

Lists had been an integral part of Teddy Bass's life ever since he turned 11 and his dad turned into a workaholic. They kept his life in order, they kept his routine secure, they kept his brain from going into overdrive when he didn't know what he was supposed to be doing because he always had a list to tell him what he was supposed to be doing.

For example, he was on his way to an assembly about poetry or something. After Queller finished her droning and the 'prestigious guest speaker of the week' got off their soap box, he would be off to his advanced history class for 1st block, after which he and Lex would share a table for college algebra, and since it was a Friday, they would ditch 3rd block in favor of a post-breakfast pre-lunch snack, then they would make it back to school just in time for 4th and 5th periods, which were devoted to extended advanced physics classes. After morning classes, they would get a hot dog or a pretzel or a gyro from a nearby restaurant, laze around in Central Park for forty-five minutes, then come back to St. Jude's severely stoned, but not stoned enough to suffer through art class with Ms. Hysell, a 60 year old woman who got away with her disturbing sexual advances by claiming senility and tenure. 7th period was for his dual-credit English class, and then...it was off to the Archibald townhouse to play video games and eat one of Aunt Jenny's specially concocted banana coffee cakes (his favorite flavor).

All in all, it was a fairly good routine. He certainly didn't want to change it, and he hoped having some hoity-toity French girl hogging the guest rooms wouldn't impede his free reign of them. Lex was, after all, _his _god brother as well, and he didn't know what he would do if he couldn't crash at the Archibalds at the end of a long, hard, scheduled day (when he was entirely too lazy to call his limo and drive the TORTUROUS thirteen blocks to the high rise at 5th and East 61st).

Lex turned his focus to a really cool shaped cloud, and his train of thought derailed entirely.

They took their seats at the back of the auditorium with Maverick Sparks, when they finally managed to stop admiring the white, fluffy version of the starship _Enterprise_.

When Queller took her place at the front of the room and started to speak, Teddy slumped in his seat and sighed. It was just another one of _those days_. The kind he knew would never end, at least not until he had another half a joint to himself, and a good long night's sleep in his trusty guest bed after several hours of intense video gaming and cake.

"She's coming tonight?" he double-checked, hoping their usual plans weren't lost because of her arrival.

"Yeah, mom made a huge banana coffee flavored cake." At Teddy's marginally stoned look of intense excitement, Lex slowly nodded the affirmative. "It's her favorite, apparently."

A few straight-laced Constance girls turned in their seats to shush them, and Lex's younger sister, Lux, rolled her eyes at them from her seat in the second row. Before Queller could catch on to how little attention they were paying to her dissertation-length introduction to 'the lost art of poetry in the modern world', the two boys straightened up in their seats and kicked their feet up on the backs of the chairs in front of them.

_Fresh banana coffee cake and video games._ Teddy decided this random godsister from France wouldn't be too much of an inconvenience, after all.

* * *

**A/N:** Look, ma, no French! =] Well, not a LOT of it...not enough to warrant a translation, anyway! If the style seems different, well...it is. It's a different perspective, it's in a different tense, it's a new city, it's from a different _gender_! Had to shake things up a bit, otherwise you'd start to get complacent and I'd get...no feedback. Not to sound petty, but for the last few chapters I've gotten very little in the way of reviews (except for a few faithful peeps, who I wholeheartedly love and thank). I have to admit, this chapter almost didn't come out, because I was feeling pretty iffy about whether or not anyone was actually READING, or even _enjoying_ everything. So...if you have any thoughts you want to share or comments (positive or constructive!) you want to make, please hit that review button and let it all out!

xoxo, and see you for the next chapter. 3


	11. NYC Gone, Gone

**Author's note: **Sorry for such an intensely long time between updates! I was recently in a musical production, and that took up a lot of time and energy, then I had end of year exams, plus a plethora of events to plan and...well, clearly I am making too many excuses. =] However, I am really glad to be back writing in this world! I missed Elle and her crazy mental prose, and I'm excited to tell the rest of her story. So, without further ado...the chapter that hopefully makes up for my long hiatus.

DISCLAIMER: I use a lot of imagery from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's _The Little Prince. _I don't own that book or that story or any of the quotes from it. I just love the book. xoxo

_"Where're you gonna go with a heart that gone?"_

**CHAPTER ELEVEN**_  
NYC – Gone, Gone_

I cried when Nate's private plane took off and France became a strip of land in the barely perceptible distance, but not because I was sad to leave my home behind. There was a little part of me, past the heavy beating of my heart and the blind rage that dug half-moon shaped scars into my palms and the lead weight sitting in my gut that made it difficult to walk in a straight line and the overwhelming desire to raid the nearby minibar... there was a little part of me that was glad to see _le pays de mère _go. As far as I was concerned, it was _le pays de merde_, and I never wanted to think of it or see it or live in it again.

The light illuminating the _fasten seatbelt_ sign blinked out, and I pressed my forehead against my window. The Atlantic Ocean swam below me like one endless swimming pool, and I wanted to dive into it...to break through the surface in a spectacular swan dive. No. A haphazard cannonball which would result in a catastrophic tidal wave, which would travel east to the English Channel, where it would infiltrate the Seine and crush its way to Paris, where it would explode and drown the city forever, probably killing all 2,167,994 of its inhabitants.

Tristan was a terrible swimmer, and Sophie would be too busy despairing over her ruined makeup, and mère would...probably make a deal with the devil to get out alive, but she would be very soaked and very unhappy about her ruined wardrobe when she did. I would be long gone, of course, in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean and completely untraceable. It would be the perfect crime and no one would persecute me for it! Stupid Paris...

I almost soothed myself to sleep with the mental images.

"How are you feeling?" asked Nate from the seat beside mine.

"Inventively homicidal," I opened my eyes and stopped imagining a happy life amidst the dolphins, who would bring me food and protect me from sharks and let me sleep on their backs.

"Well, you wouldn't be a Waldorf if you didn't."

I heard the smile in his voice, but I couldn't return it. Any leftover traces of _joy_ or _happiness_ that had stubbornly clung to my heart instantly shriveled up and died as soon as that name left his lips. Dramatic imagery? Yes. But those words only barely sum up the relentless stabbing pain that clenched my chest that day. To say that I wanted to curl up into a little ball of misery and slowly die would also be quite dramatic and just as inadequate a phrase to describe how much I _really did_ want to. And not just because of that name...

_**Waldorf**_. _You wouldn't be a __**Waldorf**__..._

"I'm not," I whispered, running a hand through my hair. I let it rest on my slumped right shoulder so I could use it as a makeshift pillow, and my gaze shifted from the sea to the sky. Cotton candy clouds billowed across an infinite horizon, and I thought of my childhood when the clouds had seemed like a kingdom in the heavens... then, I was a princess, and the birds were my adoring subjects and...

I really needed to stop thinking I could communicate with animals. _Life is not a movie_, I reminded myself for the hundredth time. _Life is not a movie._

Or maybe...

I could turn things around. I could go away and mature and become the better person, and return with a grace and dignity that none of them could ever envision or hope to aspire to. They would think I wanted revenge, and I would just smile at them and confuse them and earn everyone's adoration again and win, no matter how many years passed. Janson would settle for its leggy blonde queen and its sneaky liar king with his beautiful cheekbones and Marlboro cigarettes and...

Lying mouth full of liar lies!

I could not go back until the idea of Tristan didn't simultaneously make me want to lock myself in a bedroom with candlelight and soft music and hunt him down and eviscerate him with my eyes.

"But I still feel inventively homicidal."

Nate pulled a handkerchief from his pocket, just like in all the old movies, and held it out to me. I sniffled stubbornly and refused to so much as look at it. "I know you're angry," he said, pressing the embroidered piece of expensive cloth between my hands anyway. Then he gingerly touched a few of the stray tangled clumps of what vaguely resembled my usually glossy chocolate brown hair, and tucked them behind my right ear. "And hurt and abandoned and upset, and did I mention angry?"

I bit my lip to keep from smiling. Nate always knew just how to make me crack, and always had...ever since I was a baby, according to him et ma mére. But just because he was my godfather, and just because he had only done what ma mère had asked him to do, and just because all I felt like doing was resting my head on his shoulder and asking him to tell me one of his ridiculously lame made-up bedtime stories (in which he substituted my favorite characters with him and Dorota and Aunt Jenny and ma mère or characters from his favorite action movies)...just because I didn't want to be angry with him didn't mean that I wasn't. I was. I was so angry with everyone that I could barely blink properly.

"At you, too," I bit out, thinking I was sharing a revelation.

But he just put his arm around my shoulders and pulled me into his familiar earthy scent. "I know."

Of course he knew. Everyone always knew everything I didn't...

I closed my eyes and let myself pretend, like I so desperately wanted to, that I was just a girl and that I was a princess, and the clouds were my kingdom and the plane was my riverboat. The hum of the engine and the soothing oldies playing on the Bose speakers (I abstractly heard the words "there's nowhere we can go with nothing underneath" before I drifted back to my fantasy) and the feeling of the initials N.A. beneath my fingertips stemmed the tears and I wasn't angry anymore.

"Tell me a story?" I remember murmuring, half-asleep as a dreamy voice sang about thin ice.

Nate squeezed my shoulder and chuckled. I felt it rumbling in his chest, beneath his steady heartbeat.

"_Once upon a time, there were two little girls," Nate handed me my favorite teddy bear – who was named Teddy and wore a polka-dot bowtie – and tucked my covers up to my chin. In the bed beside me, my god sister Lux cradled her Strawberry Shortcake doll who was cute, but nowhere near as cuddly and adorable as my teddy bear, which had wide black button eyes and a pink smile on his fluffy brown face. I nuzzled his fur and giggled at Lux as Nate continued._

"_Their names were Lux," he tapped his daughter on the nose, "and Elle." He tried to tap mine, but I dodged just in time._

"_But that's us!" I complained, sitting up and trying to pout the way my mother did when she painted her lips red. Nate snorted at my effort and gently nudged me back onto my pillow. "Tell us a story about someone else." I was already back up with my Happy Face pajama-clad arms crossed over my chest in indignation. "And not Bruce Willis."_

_His lips snapped shut, as if he had indeed been about to venture into a tale about his favorite action star._

_Lux rubbed her eyes and yawned. "Whoever it's about, tell it soon. I'ma fall asleep…"_

"_All right, Luxie, hold on a sec."_

_He fixed the covers and made sure that I was tucked in so tightly that I couldn't possibly escape before morning, then crouched back down beside us and scratched the top of his head. "I could tell you a story about me?"_

"_Boring," Lux instantly shook her blonde curls and made her Strawberry Shortcake shake her head too. "Tell us about someone fun."_

"_Like Serena!" I knew I practically had stars in my eyes, but my jet-setting godmother Serena had been the pinnacle of cool in my early childhood._

"_Boring!" Lux protested yet again, rolling onto her stomach and burying her head in one of my feather down pillows. "We can hear about her any old time."_

"_You think of someone then," I snapped, struggling against my Egyptian cotton prison in an attempt to kick my best friend in the knees._

"_I will!" Her head popped up and she wore the same extra thoughtful facial expression as her father. Feeling left out, I tried to force my eyebrows to furrow and my lips to pinch together just like theirs, but all I managed was a rather displeased looking scowl. By the time I had reverted to ma mére's pout, Lux was on her feet, bouncing around on my bed like her usual hyper self. "Tell us abooooooout Teddy's daddy."_

_Nate walked around to Lux's side of the bed and picked her up by her armpits. She kicked her feet in a vain attempt to stave him off, but soon she was in a cocoon much like mine, her arms stuck to her sides and hardly able to wriggle her toes. We looked at each other, looked at each other's mummified bodies, and sighed in defeat. It really _was_ bedtime._

"_How about Uncle Dan, instead?"_

"_No!" Lux thrust her bottom lip up. "Teddy's daddy."_

"_Not tonight, Luxie. Someone else, tonight." If I had been older than seven, maybe I would have noticed the way he looked at me, with a nervous quiver behind his eyes, and the way his voice was a little too firm for a matter so trivial. But I was only a few weeks shy of eight years old, and my keen skills of observation had not yet been honed. Instead, I stared at the canopy over my mattress and imagined that we were in an airplane that was flying over a vast, open sea._

_Then the sea turned into sand, and the sand became rocks, and the rocks tumbled across grass, which spanned for fields and fields and across countries and on either side of crystal blue rivers. The rivers turned greener and greener and then sort of brown and the grass did too, until there was no more grass, just more sand. But the sand was not soft and white, but gold and coarse and it made mountains that turned into valleys that became mountains again with every gust of wind._

_A snake wound its way across a smattering of footprints, and a little boy sat on a stone wall and asked to be bitten. Our plane crashed near the boy, and the boy told us he was from the stars, and I imagined that I was from the stars and that I met a king who counted things, or was it a lamp-lighter who was a king? A rose yelled at me from across the galaxy and the boy said:_

"_One should never listen to the flowers. One should simply look at them and breathe their scent."_

_So I ignored the flower and went to the moon and then Mercury, and watched the sunset from close up. The boy sat next to me, but he didn't look like the boy in the book. The scruffy hair was brown and even more unruly, and his cape was purple and covered with a shimmering sort of glittery material. I smiled at him and he smiled back at me and we joined hands before we walked back to our planet together. The two of us came to a crowded corner in a strange city. It was not Paris, the buildings were so shiny and the street beneath my shoes was paved differently. The crowd was dense and black, and I began to feel suffocated by the constant shuffling and movement. Just when I was about to scream for Tristan or Nate to come and get me, a strong hand clenched my shoulder protectively, and I felt a warm body encompass mine as the arm settled over my shoulders. The boy beside me received the same treatment, and looked up at our savior with adoration._

_We were led away from the crowd and into a large green park, where children were running and flying kites as adults played music and pushed each other on swing sets._

_I looked up, because I could still feel the warm, possessive arm around my shoulders, and I wanted to tell this stranger a hearty 'Merci beaucoup!' for helping me out of that horrible street._

_The sharply defined face above me was the same face in the fading photograph, only it was looking down at me with affection. He opened his mouth to speak as I gasped, and I felt the sun shining down from the east. The boy laughed and hugged Chuck Bass's leg, before taking off and joining a crowd of children who were gathered around a particular kite. Except it wasn't a kite at all, but a float. Chuck ruffled my hair and nudged me toward the same group of children then turned and walked down a winding path that led to a waiting limo. It glinted in the moonlight._

_I raised my eyes to the sky and it was night, the stars twinkled and sang above me and I was back in the desert. A yellow snake uncoiled in front of me._

"_You will see where my track begins, in the sand. You have nothing to do but wait for me there. I shall be there tonight."_

_I frowned and tried to explain that I was a princess and could not be consorting with snakes, when the snake grew and there was a tree and Tristan blew a ring of smoke that turned into a heart and framed his face. His cheekbones were sharp in the light. "Let me take you home, ma petite." His fingers curled in my long hair, then his palm cupped my neck while his other hand tilted my chin toward his. "Your mother is still in the States, isn't she?"_

"_No..." I frowned deeper and touched my curls. Why were they so long? "She's in Paris and I'm going to the States."_

_Tristan smirked and lean close, so close that our lips touched and I breathed his air. "Running away from your problems?"_

"_No. I'm running to...I'm going to find something out." I looked around, and the street was wrong. A lamp-lighter was extinguishing a light, then reigniting its flame, then extinguishing it again. All the while, he glanced down at his pocket watch and mumbled to himself. Across the street, a gaggle of girls sashayed past and one of them was blonde with long legs and impeccably shaped pink lips, and she smiled at Tristan and he chucked me on the chin._

"_Here's lookin' at you, kid."_

_And he went to her._

"_This isn't right," I said to no one in particular. "This isn't Casablanca, this isn't...I'm not here."_

_The snake slithered down from the tree and circled my feet. "It's all deteriorated rather rapidly, hasn't it?"_

_I looked down and suddenly remembered that I had been terrified of snakes ever since my first trip to the zoo. It disappeared._

"_What are you doing out of bed?"_

_Ma mère__ stood in front of a sputtering airplane, a hat shielding her eyes from the sun. She put a hand on her hip and eyed me up and down. "Nate has been looking everywhere for you."_

_I was scooped up and put back in bed beside Lux, who was fast asleep and drooling on her Strawberry Shortcake. "No more running away," he kissed my forehead and tucked the covers in around me again. I was small and clad in my Happy Face pajamas, and Teddy the bear was tucked securely under my arm. I felt ma mére's diary under the pillow beneath my head, and I knew the picture was safely in its hiding place. Nate and ma mère__ turned off the lights and shut the door, and I was left with the silence._

I woke up when the plane touched the ground, and the evidence I had cried in my sleep was dry on my cheeks.

A look out the window revealed that it was nighttime, and I briefly thought I was still trapped in my dream. But the Nate who was helping unload our luggage was not the same Nate who had tucked me into bed with my bear, and Lux was nowhere to be seen. I rubbed my eyes and tried to remember why there had been a snake and why Tristan had been there – oh, that made sense, he and the evil snake were clearly in cahoots.

How dare that cretin intrude on my dreams, I thought. How _dare_ he infiltrate my most private thoughts and ruin them with his stupid cigarettes and his stupid voice and his stupid cheekbones. I felt like strangling something. Probably a snake, but I would be hard pressed to find one at an airport.

Then I looked at myself in the reflection of the airplane window, saw the sharp jaw and the angled eyebrows, and the dark fathomless eyes on top of the round nose, and...Chuck Bass had been in my dream. I had had _that_ particular dream before, with the crowds and I vaguely remembered kites and swing sets, and I _certainly_ remembered the feeling of his leather glove on my shoulder, and the way the light hit the angles of his face, and the way he looked as he was about to speak. What had he been about to say?

But there had been someone else, too. A boy...

Nate poked his head back into the plane to make sure I had roused myself, and smiled slightly when he saw the state of my hair. "Helicopter's ready."

I nodded, vaguely feeling the handkerchief he had given me in the palm of my left fist. It was strange, but I could tell that I wasn't in France anymore, just from the air or the smell or the way my body felt in the seat. My clothes were ill-fitting all of the sudden, and my shoes far too loose. I knew I looked like a streetwalker who had been on the clock for a few days too long, who was desperately in need of a shower and a tan, and maybe even a glass of wine. God, I would have killed for a glass of wine.

Instead, I cleaned myself up as best I could, thanked God that it was night, therefore dark, therefore less people would see me in my haggard state, and walked down the stairs to the even concrete ground that waited. I was right about the air being different, and even though the sun wasn't out, I could see that light was distributed in ways I hadn't seen before. The stars were invisible, which I was used to, but their absence was accentuated by a milky film over the black sky, and I suddenly wished I had stayed home with mère and Dorota and Dorota's cookies.

"Coming, Elle?" Nate had already loaded what he could into the helicopter, and the rest had already shipped out in a glossy black Lincoln town car.

It was all happening so fast. Couldn't we take a moment to breathe? Maybe...sit down and have a coffee and talk about stuff?

If only I hadn't slept the entire flight...I would be up all night, between that and the 6 hour time difference. It was 6 AM in my home city and it was Saturday, which meant mère was allowed to sleep in until 11. Dorota was already up and bustling around, cleaning the already immaculate kitchen, preparing brunch for mére, going back and forth between the stove and her garden, where she was doing the best she could to repair her belladonna lilies. The lights were dimming around the city and things were coming into gray perspective. The light was hitting my room from the east in a straight line of pale gold light, but the bed was empty.

Before I could think about the wide open closet doors or the blank walls or the locked windows, I nodded and ran to the open seat next to my godfather.

Seeing Manhattan for the first time was not the movie moment it should have been. It was, in fact, wasted entirely on me because I had never laid awake at night thinking about it, fantasizing about it, wishing I was there, imagining what it would be like to walk its busy streets, or look at it from above as the helicopter allowed me to. It was different than seeing Paris from the air...there, the lines were not quite so straight, but they were more manicured somehow. Manhattan was odd clumps, and it fanned out then in then out again, like it couldn't make up its mind. The lights were brilliant, not indistinct like the ones I would have seen at home, and I instantly loved it somehow.

And suddenly, it was a movie, but all too late. We landed at the East 34th Street Heliport, and I was in the thick of things. The lights were taller than any I'd ever stood under, and I felt invigorated by the crisp night air. Somewhere, conceivably, within 22.96 square miles of where I was standing (I had done my research), was Chuck Bass. The knowledge thrummed inside my chest and spread to my arms like an adrenaline rush, and I hugged my small carry-on bag close to my body. Inside it was ma mére's diary and all the clues I would need to piece together in order to learn the whole truth.

I looked over at Nate, who was making sure my smaller suitcases were stacked into the trunk properly, and smiled as wide as I ever had.

I still wanted to see all of my former friends drown in a pool of their own salty tears of bitter and pleading remorse, but I had other things to take care of first.

The town car took us west on East 34th Street and turned right onto Park Avenue. I could see the Empire State Building illuminated in the rearview mirror when we were far enough uptown – I could tell we were going uptown because the numbers at the intersections kept increasing.

68th...

69th...

70th...

71st...

72nd...

73rd...

When we got to 74th Street, the driver nearly got us killed, or so it seemed to me, by swinging a sharp left and narrowly avoiding a bicyclist who was pedaling through a red light. The bicyclist made a few colorful hand gestures and shouted a lot, but the words were lost on me, because twenty seconds later we were in front of it.

The house.

The beautiful white townhouse with the pretty white columns at the front door, and the wrought iron gates, and the stone stairs, and the pretty green ivy growing up the sides in a perfectly controlled way. The windows reflected the lights of other windows, and the tall green tree in front of it had a pretty red ribbon tied around its trunk. I wondered why Nate would want a red ribbon tied to his tree, when I noticed there was something dangling from it...an envelope with a name written on the front.

My name, I guessed.

I giggled because I recognized the game. Whenever the Archibalds had visited ma mère at papére's chateau, Lux and I had amused ourselves with various games of hide-and-seek, either played the traditional way or with rules we made ourselves when the game grew stale. Our favorite variation was more like a scavenger hunt, which involved us writing little riddles to each other and putting them in envelopes for the other to find. Whoever found all their envelopes by solving the riddles first, won, and got to wear a red ribbon in her hair until the other won, and so on for infinity.

As the chauffeur took great pains to unload my luggage and carry it up the stairs, I bypassed Nate and ran straight for the red ribbon.

_**Elle**_ the envelope read. I had guessed right.

Inside was cream-colored stationary with an elaborate L in the left hand corner. In her perfectly stilted cursive, Lux had written:

_This clue is just the first  
__In a series of other hints__  
And unless you're cursed  
You'll find this game a cinch_

I rolled my eyes fondly at Lux's bad poetry – it hadn't improved with age.

_Take two steps to the left, and two steps to the right  
And you will find yourself within a pool of light_

In fact, it took three steps to the left and five steps to the right, but I got what she meant. I was underneath the streetlamp that stood on their street. Nate came over with his hands in his pockets and scanned the paper with a disinterested eye. "She's telling you where to find your key. It's under the – "

"Nate!" I protested, clutching the poem to my chest as if shielding the words from him would make him forget what he had read. "Don't take all the fun out of it!"

_Now walk six paces forward  
And kneel upon your knees  
And you will find the items  
Most people call spare keys!_

Reminding myself not to make fun of her too harshly for completely abandoning her rhyme-scheme halfway through the terribly childlike poem, I did as she requested exactly as she requested, walking precisely six steps forward, sinking down to my knees, and reaching underneath the potted plant for the set of spare keys that would allow me access to the Archibald home. I smiled as the little silver things shone in the light – Aunt Jenny or Lux had polished them to make sure they looked brand new. I glanced up quickly to make sure that Nate hadn't already let himself in, but he was standing against the back door of the black town car, looking up at the house with an odd look on his face.

"Nate?" I ventured, pushing myself back to my feet and frowning at him. I had never seen him look so sad, not even when his mère died and the Archibalds came to France to get away.

He didn't look at me for several seconds, and when he did it was like I wasn't even there. "Go ahead, they're waiting for you."

I clutched the keys and started to walk up the polished stone steps, but he didn't move a muscle. "Aren't you coming?"

Nate shook his head and opened the car door for himself. "Patrick will take your things in."

On cue, the chauffeur stepped forward with five of my bags in hand and tipped his head as if to say 'Yes, I will take care of your things for you, ma'am'. And it was such a movie moment that I couldn't help staring as my godfather's shoulders sunk, and he ducked into the back of his town car looking like a broken Ken doll. I didn't know what was happening – he was leaving, clearly, but how could he? How could he say he would take care of me in this big new city I had never been to and promise that he wouldn't ever let anything happen to me and then just leave? Didn't he want to be there for me anymore?

"I'll be in later, I promise," he reassured me after rolling down his tinted window. Perhaps he had seen the expression on my face. "I will, and we'll go to breakfast tomorrow."

"Promise?" I wanted to hear it again, because if I didn't then he might not mean it.

"I promise, Elle. Go in."

He rolled the window back up and then I couldn't see him anymore.

There was nothing else to do, unless I wanted to stand on the bottom step all night staring at the tinted glass and forcing Patrick to hold onto my very heavy luggage. So, I turned on my heel, jogged up the remaining four steps, and used my personal keys to unlock the doors to the Archibald town house.

* * *

**TRANSLATIONS:**_  
Le pays de mère – _the mother country_  
Le pays de merde –_ the shit country


	12. Dear Diary: Moon in June Stuff

"_The life of every man is a diary in which he means to write one story, and writes another."  
-- J.M. Barrie  
_

**CHAPTER TWELVE**_  
Moon in June Stuff_

It happened yesterday and they won't let me get out of bed. Having a TV in the room will apparently also stress me out, so they've taken away my remote control and they won't even let me listen to music. ...I'm feeling a little irritated right now, to be quite honest, that the only thing I have to do is write in this stupid diary that yes, I have stopped pretending to loathe quite so much, but which also is still very, very stupid.

I miss Chuck, because he had to go home and take a shower because he was starting to be sort of rank, and there's nothing we can do now except wait for the doctors to tell me I can go home. I wish I was at home, because then it would be a lot easier not to think about it. I knew it would be hard, I read all the books and went to all the therapists to mentally prepare myself, but I didn't think it would be this hard. This? This is unbearable. I bet Audrey Hepburn never had to put up with something like this...

I wasn't awake for it, because obviously I blacked out, but from what they told me about the surgery and the transfusion, I know I lost a lot of blood and they took the little baby away to the NICU. I didn't get to so much as hold him or touch him or even look into his eyes because I couldn't even stay awake and now my sentences are becoming run-ons, aren't they? This is what happens when you get pregnant and have to take a leave of absence from Yale University. Your grammar goes to hell. It just figures, doesn't it? This isn't therapeutic at all. I should have just taken the doctor's advice and slept for fourteen hours, but I just can't. I wonder if his eyes were blue or brown? Because I know most babies have blue eyes, but he had to be born with brown eyes. And brown hair.

I wonder if he had hair, or if he was bald. That would be funny; I probably would have laughed at that. Chuck would have been horrified and I would have promptly declared him to be Bartholomew Bass II. OR Bartholomew Bass-Waldorf, like I've been threatening. (- fragment) Not that I would ever do that. I like introducing myself as Blair Bass way too much to ever hyphenate or go back to Waldorf, but it's always a handy card to have up my sleeve. (- Chuck would be proud of the poker talk)

I wish Chuck would come back so there would be someone in this godforsaken smelly place to comfort me and bring Handsome to visit because I know he's going crazy all cooped up in the penthouse. Maybe mom will design me a hospital gown made of silk charmeuse so I can get out of this straightjacket. What is it made of, cotton and plastic and polyblend? It's evil and it must die. Please?

Anyway, I'm not upset about the hospital gown and I'm not upset about Handsome and I'm not upset about my last name. I want to hold my baby that I carried for 36 weeks and I can't. I want him and I want to look into his big brown eyes and know that it was all worth it and that everything is going to turn out perfectly and he's going to be all mine to love forever and buy things for. And I'll call him Charlie and kiss him on his big bushy brown head and I won't be crying all the time which is really not good for my complexion. It's a good thing Serena brought my moisturizer because otherwise I would probably actually be dead now, never mind the emergency surgery and disgusting transfusion. Who knows whose blood I've got in me...some hobo who needed a buck for the liquor store, probably.

That would be my luck, to almost die and then mutate into a hobo. Next thing I'll be buying a brownstone in the Village, dying my hair black, and turning into one of those weird super vegans who don't eat anything with a shadow.

Life is all downhill from here, Blair Bass. The sooner you accept that, the sooner you can go home, curl up in your king-sized bed, and lament the fact that little Charlie Bass baby is probably playing one of those harps in a Michelangelo painting because that joke Eric made about him being the spawn of Satan is so not funny when you think about it in this context.

They said he was tiny and didn't cry...

Okay, diary, nice try. I'm calling a nurse, getting some medicine, and sleeping for fourteen hours. Chuck will be here when I wake up and everything will be fine.

As usual,_  
Blair Bass_


	13. All About Elle

**Author's note:** Welcome to lucky chapter number thirteen, which is a mammoth-like creature and I hope you like it and that it makes up for that pesky two month long hiatus I took between chapters ten and eleven. That is all. =] Thank you for your reviews and support! Also, since this thing is so very long, I sort of said 'HAH' to reading it over when I was done writing, just because I was so very glad to be done writing it. So if you spot any errors, spelling or otherwise, do point them out _please_, because I probably missed them. Merci beaucoup!

xoxo

**CHAPTER THIRTEEN**_  
All About Elle_

I was positively infected.

Not only had I abruptly and unceremoniously fallen in love with New York City, but I felt like an entirely new person when I walked up and down its busy streets. Every way my eye turned there was something _new_, something _different_, something shiny and spectacular that I had never imagined before. Everyone was on their way somewhere, walking with a purpose, with focus, with a fast-paced step that made them weave in and out of each other in an intricate dance that required no physical contact – and when there was physical contact, it was a non-issue. No apologies, no hurt feelings, no stopping to fret about what people would think if there were was no penance paid. People just moved on with their lives, went to the next thing without a second thought about what they had just been doing.

I _loved it_.

I had been right, standing at the heliport when the city was lit only by its sheer brilliance and the very faint stars behind a milky film above; light fell differently in Manhattan. I never realized it until I stepped out of the Archibald townhouse for the first time in broad daylight and _really saw things_, but I had been looking at the world through a hazy mist for sixteen years. Even though the day was gloomy, and the sun was hidden behind a brigade of angry clouds, everything was sharper and crisper and in better focus.

And for some reason, I just couldn't stop smiling.

Maybe it was the feeling of a new beginning, or the knowledge that I was there to put my life on track, or maybe it was just the way the city made me feel _useful_. Whatever it was, I skipped down the front steps on my first Sunday in the city and beamed at Nate and Lux as they followed me down.

I hadn't seen much of Lex the night before, only bade him a brief hello before he and his perpetually bored-looking friend Teddy retreated to his room with two plates of banana coffee cake so they could play ten hours of some video game undisturbed. Jenny had greeted me with a warm hug and then spent the following three hours feeding me and trying to avoid talking about ma mère, Paris, or school. I had contemplated outright asking if she knew where Chuck Bass was and how soon she thought I could talk to him, but I had a feeling she had signed the same evil pact of silence Nate had.

Lux, of course, had breached the topic for us in her own loveably clueless way.

"So, Ells, why the big move?"

Aunt Jenny's immediate response had been to suddenly fake a loud coughing fit in order to avoid the subject entirely.

"You don't have to do that," I swallowed a big gulp of banana coffee cake, took a moment to savor the sweet symphony of flavor, and then pushed my empty plate away. "I'm fine."

Lux had then looked back and forth between us as if wondering what the big deal was. Actually, not 'as if' – I'm fairly certain Aunt Jenny purposefully kept her in the dark about my reasons for coming to Manhattan in a misguided attempt to keep Lux from asking about it. I could have told her that tactic was doomed to failure and saved us all the embarrassingly fake and overly dramatic fatal coughing illness.

"Of course you are, you're here with _us_." Lux then speared her own piece of cake and brandished it to accentuate her point. "Did you finally get tired of boring old Paris?"

I could have said any number of things to that. I could have defended my city with all the haughtiness and snobby coldness I had spent my teenage years perfecting, I could have reminded her that just because she always got lost in Paris and didn't know how to read a map didn't mean it was a boring place, I could have nodded and left it at that, or I could have spilled the whole sordid story and overwhelmed her with the utter wreck my life had become.

Instead, I did the thing a Waldorf is never supposed to do when asked a direct question.

I _shrugged_.

Noncommittally, even!

And then, I promptly changed the subject.

"What's the deal with Lex?" I dutifully ignored Lux's look of We'll Be Talking More About This Later! and soldiered on. "Is he a hermit now?"

That was when the most peculiar thing happened. Both Aunt Jenny _and_ Lux both looked away at the exact same time wearing the exact same facial expression – they went from How Did I Raise Such a Socially Clueless Daughter, God Love Her and We'll Be Talking More About This Later! to toddlers who had been caught eating Dorota's freshly baked cookies right before dinnertime even though they had been explicitly told not to but they couldn't resist because Dorota makes the best cookies in the _world_.

(Guilty embarrassment.)

"What?" I had asked them, taking a page out of Lux's book and looking back and forth to legitimately ask what the big deal was. "What did I say?"

That was when Nate came home and Aunt Jenny rushed back to her home office to 'finish a few sketches and make a few calls, sweet dreams Ellie, we'll talk more tomorrow when you're not so jet-lagged', leaving Lux and I to share another three slices of banana coffee cake when he sat down with us. Nate had been quiet at first, glancing back at the hallway Jenny had disappeared down and being careful not to let his fork scrape too loudly against the white china, but he had lightened up after a few coaxing jokes about his silly tie. But when we asked him where he had been since he dropped me off at the doorstep, he stole my noncommittal shrug and went to _his_ home office to 'work on a few last-minute proposals and see if I can't fix the math on that last contract, goodnight you two, don't stay up too late talking, we're going to breakfast tomorrow'.

Lux and I had spent the remainder of the evening chattering in her bedroom, looking at old photographs, and chastising each other about our haircuts. 'Let it grow out!' she had berated, touching my bobcat haircut and pulling on a few tresses for good measure. 'Run a brush through yours!' I had giggled back, digging my fingers into her scalp and pretending that they were stuck. I had studiously avoided all the topics Jenny had been so careful to ignore, and decided I would tell her my reasons for coming to New York once I had put some distance between myself and the memories... And once I had figured out how to find Chuck Bass.

I knew I couldn't just walk up to the Bass Industries offices and demand to speak with the CEO on the basis that I was possibly his biological daughter, especially since Nate had taken my passport and birth certificate out of my suitcase and locked them up somewhere so I couldn't leave the country whenever the whim struck me. I had no proof, other than what _I_ thought was a startling resemblance to a picture of him that had been taken eighteen years before.

Before I could mull over my plan too thoroughly and fix all its little errors – I had started about twenty to-do lists, but hadn't been able to finish writing any of them – Nate grabbed my arm and yanked me rather violently out of both my reverie and the middle of Park Avenue before I got myself killed by an oncoming delivery truck. There was a loud horn blast and a squealing of tires as the driver rounded the corner and narrowly avoided hitting a cab on its way through the intersection.

"Ellie!" Lux grabbed my other hand and started checking me for injuries. The cab driver was shouting angry phrases in fragmented Polish behind her, and I recognized some of them from all my years with Dorota. The sudden realization that my childhood nanny and lifelong companion was on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, coupled with the fact that I had just been a hair's breadth away from being a pancake on the asphalt, made me feel a little dizzy. "Are you okay?"

I wasn't okay. I was away from home in a strange city that didn't smell like home and people didn't stop when lights turned red and ma mère might not be ma mère and maybe it was okay that I shrugged noncommittally because I wasn't a Waldorf, and I might not even be a Bass, and Dorota wasn't with me and I liked cake and all but I really missed her cookies and the belladonna lilies and _God_ I felt like a five-year-old. I just wanted to be under my covers with my flashlight and a fairytale and mère in one of her fancy dresses and to know with absolute certainty who I was and who she was and that we belonged in each others' worlds.

I wanted to be home and never have to grow up.

Nate tightened his grip around my arm and all but dragged me to the other side of the intersection. Lux padded along behind us looking alarmed, and I fully understood why. My godfather looked more angry than I had ever seen him, even more disarrayed than when he let Chuck's name slip over lunch back in France; the furrow of his brow was deeper, and the stiffness in his shoulders traveled all the way down his arms to his fingers, which felt like they were actually breaking through my skin to the bone underneath.

The words he wasn't saying flittered in the air between us, and that's when I started to think that maybe I didn't want things to be sharper and crisper and in better focus, maybe life was better with a film over my eyes that cast the world in a filter of gray. Because in the harsh slanted light that filtered so sparsely through the trees that lined the street, I saw that what I had thought was a halo surrounding my white knight of a godfather was really just a very convincing mask. And over the years, he had become not a Greek god, but a decaying stone representation of one, with trenches and imperfections in his Armani-clad marble.

He wasn't mad at me, he was mad at himself.

It wasn't my arm he was breaking, it was his.

I used my free hand to flatten my bangs over my eyes. I didn't want to look at him and not see his halo.

He let go of me when we reached a tall, narrow tree that bent forward as if burdened by the thin, golden leaves on its branches. Little sprigs grew out of the trunk, but their leaves were scattered on the otherwise pristine pavement below; a few of them stuck to Nate's shoes when he broke his vice grip and pushed himself away without another word. Lux came to my side and gently looped her arm underneath my elbow, and I was silently grateful for the wordless support. Something in the way she gently squeezed my forearm made me remember the dream I'd had on the plane, when Chuck had taken me away from the angry crowd and led me across a busy street into a wide, open space with kites and swing sets.

Nate got to the corner of 74th and 3rd, took a rather aimless left turn, and disappeared.

Lux brushed my bangs out of my eyes and tugged me under the red awning of Cucina Vivolo.

"He's just on a walk," she offered, seating herself at one of the little round tables and waving cheerfully to the maître d' inside. He gathered some menus and made his way out to us. "He'll be back in like ten minutes, after he's contemplated the universe and bought us some candy or something."

I accepted that because it sounded like the Nate Archibald I knew, but something in my chest made me want to stroke Lux's hair and tell her it would all be okay.

Maybe she saw the intention in my eyes, or a twitch in my fingers, but my god sister beamed and changed the subject with about as much grace and flawlessness as her mother had tried to the night before. "So," here she paused to imitate Aunt Jenny's bout of fake coughing and I couldn't help but laugh and hit her on the arm with my newly acquired menu. "Are you gonna tell me what the deal is or not?"

My overwhelming urge to be a child again encouraged me to unfold my menu and pretend I didn't speak English. "Quoi?"

The deeply annoyed groan I incited was just what I had been hoping for. Lux Archibald, for all her quirky charms and talents, had never been able to master français.

"Can we s'il vous plait not go down this route? You know French gives me a très grand headache."

"Je ne sais pas que toi signifiez." I made a big show of browsing through the menu, even though I had utterly lost my appetite.

"Eleanor," she tried to break my focus by using my dreaded full first name, but my hours of drama lessons hadn't been for naught. In fact, I somehow managed to look even more blankly at her than I had before, and this caused her to groan even louder. "I swear if you don't start speaking English right this second, I will take this fork and faire vous dormir avec les poissons! Correct my pronunciation or word usage or something and I will cut you Brooklyn style." She brandished her fork at me in what she clearly thought was a menacing manner.

I simply giggled – how could I not? She'd just used _vous_ instead of _toi_, pronounced _plait_ as if she was talking about the hairstyle, unsuccessfully tried to quote _The Godfather,_ and threatened to 'cut' me Brooklyn style. "I can honestly say I have no idea what that means," I pushed her fork out of my face and held down the impulse to grab my own fork and challenge her to a fork duel. "You'll _what_?"

"Cut you," Lux repeated. Then, slowly, as if teaching something to a very obstinate four-year-old, "Brooklyn style."

"Which...means..." I was vaguely aware that Brooklyn was part of New York City or something, but other than that all I had were ma mère's rather blistering accounts to go by, and that meant that Lux would either stab me with a dirty knife and give me hepatitis or...stab me with a dirty knife and give me the bubonic plague. mère's opinion of Brooklyn basically revolved around really bad, really offensive sounding diseases. "What?"

Lux heaved a longsuffering sigh and took a sip from the glass of water our waiter had just delivered. "Never mind, it was this whole bit about coal ovens and how there's no such thing as 'Brooklyn style', and Domino's is a multinational right-wing fascist organization... Violet thought it was funny." Her lips fell into a spectacular imitation of Nate's pout.

The familiarity of it helped me forget the look on his face when the delivery truck's horn blared and the Polish cab driver called us all sorts of names, and the air was suddenly a little brighter. New York was pretty again, and I was perfectly happy to be there, especially when I remembered the way I had left things back in Paris. Yes, I missed Dorota and my walk-in closet and my limo driver and walking around with my 'friends' mocking the tourists, but there was nothing left for me there. Not according to mère's diary, anyway.

If I hadn't already been thinking about it, I probably never would have answered Lux's question when she asked it again.

"So? Why the big move, E? Got tired of the bad driving? The extreme distance between us? The smelly cheese? What?"

I twirled the water in my cup and wondered why there was no ice. "It was a boy..."

_Monday morning was bright and clear, or as bright and clear as mornings get in the middle of autumn. I spent forty-five minutes in my closet with Dorota, discussing the pros and cons of certain outfits, and debating over whether to wear my Lanvin Oxford ankle boots or my new Christian Louboutin black suede round-toe kitten heels, before ma mère__ ducked her head in to see what was going on and found us in a pile of white button down blouses and pencil skirts in every imaginable shade of black and blue._

"_What's the occasion?" she asked, arching a finely manicured eyebrow and sending Dorota downstairs to feed the dogs._

_Before my fortunate discovery of Gossip Girl, I probably would have responded with something snippy and dismissive. But what I'd gleaned from the 'Bassdorf' archives and the accompanying stories about ma mère__'s rule over Constance Billard School for Girls prompted me to bite my lip, brush my bangs out of my eyes, and ask, "What would you wear to a sort of disciplinary hearing meets hostile takeover sort of thing?"_

_Together, we constructed an ensemble that was both stylish and appropriate, but somehow more befitting my personality than hers. I fastened the dainty flower necklace mère__ had brought from Aunt Jenny underneath the shirt's collar, and blanched when I saw mère__'s reflection setting a white silk headband just over the beginning of my bangs. It sprang from behind my ears in a pearl and tuille floral motif that looked, admittedly, very regal against the darkness of my hair. But at the same time, it was a headband and I wasn't universally known as a proponent for hair accessories. "Don't you think that might be too much?"_

"_I don't think Marie Antoinette said 'is this tiara too much' when they crowned her Queen of France."_

_I refrained from reminding her that Marie Antoinette was also beheaded because her subjects thought she was too excessive._

_The ride to school had never been so torturous. I imagined all the different facial expressions Sophie would make when the whispers broke out behind hands, and the eyes flickered between the two of us and decided that I was more worthy of their appreciative gaze. She would be hurt and hold back tears, shocked and blink rapidly to try and clear her vision, offended and grasping the handle of her favorite pink Chanel purse in disbelief, angry and unable to form a coherent sentence, and broken. The last one would be the key to my success, because I had decided to be munificent and grant her my forgiveness. I would offer her the handkerchief I had tucked into the pocket of my new white Valentino studded tote, put a comforting hand around her shoulder, and lead her to a private corner to 'talk'._

_And the best part about it was, with her reputation completely ruined, she would be in no position to tell me who to lose my virginity to._

_I would recommend she stop pursuing Tristan, lest she just start to seem desperate, and I would assure her we would 'get through this together'._

_Everything would be perfect. I was at the top of my highly competitive class, knew all the right people and wore all the right clothes, and was about to take my place as the rightful and unquestionable _pearl_ of the student body. All of my fantasies about running in the most exclusive society circles and dictating the fashion decisions of every woman in the city put what _papère_ called 'the Waldorf smile' on my face._

_My chauffeur stopped where he always did on Rue de la Pompe, so I could make my rounds and reach the sight of Sophie's ultimate humiliation at just the right moment._

_People stopped to smile at me, and I smiled back, a rather perceptible spring in my step as I swung my tote bag back and forth and listened to the sweet sound of Monday morning chatter on the air. I listened a bit for Sophie's name, maybe to hear someone deriding her outfit or putting down her choice of shoes, but the only gossip I could hear clearly was about a charity gala that weekend, to which I already decided I would be wearing a classic Chanel sequin-embroidered tulle evening gown with some kind of decorative headband because I was really starting to like the feel of one behind my ears._

_Just one of those fashion innovations that would soon sweep the most exclusive fashionistas circles throughout Europe._

_I reached my destination a little too soon for my liking, because my walk around the school's property had afforded me an opportunity to really appraise my kingdom and decide what changes I would like to make. For one, no more tacky leggings. That's when my eyes lit upon Sophie Schumacher sitting at the top of the steps in a pair of electric blue leggings that did wonders for her already kilometer-long legs, and I decided that it was good of me to forgive her. A second-in-command must always break fashion rules._

_That's when I noticed something was definitely _not_ right._

_Her legs were angled toward another pair of legs, these belonging to a male, whose very familiar hand was massaging her left knee._

_She giggled and tossed her long blonde hair and Tristan leaned in to whisper something in her ear._

He's just putting on a show,_ I tried to convince myself._ Any second now David and Leon will walk up and expose the whole thing...

_They did walk up. But it was to clap Tristan on the back and laugh over something he said to them. And Eve wrapped her arms around David's torso and gave him an affectionate kiss on the neck. She and Sophie laughed and compared patent leather flats, which were apparently all the rage because I had seen about seventeen girls wearing them on the way to the front doors._

All right, they'll bring it up in casual conversation, and...and...

_Tristan's eyes found mine and I saw what I had seen in the hallway the day before. That flicker of annoyance that I would have given anything to erase, and suddenly our kisses underneath the chestnut tree on Avenue Foch, the nights spent evading Lucien Poirier, the conversations on the white chaise lounge chair in front of the window, the glasses of wine we shared, all the little times he brushed my hair off my neck and kissed the top of my head in a silent goodnight, the way he held me in my bathtub when all I needed was someone who cared to be with me and not ask questions... all of it meant nothing, because I understood what was about to happen. I didn't know exactly what it would be or how it would play out, but I knew it would be the end of everything._

_And a very unWaldorf emotion trembled its way down my spine._

_He turned his dark head, parted his pink lips, and suddenly Sophie's eyes were on me too. And there wasn't a trace of appreciation._

Our food sat untouched in front of us, and I avoided the look of pity I knew had come to rest on top of Lux's inquisitive pout.

"He lied to you?"

She broke the silence when I ducked my head to dam the oncoming tears with the handkerchief Nate had given me in the plane. Its initials were incredibly wrinkled, and I was fairly certain the delicate fabric had not been designed to withstand a heartbroken teenage girl's onslaught of salty tears. I had never seen Nate cry, after all, and it was his personal handkerchief. It reminded me of Tristan's embroidered Zippo lighter and I let it fall underneath the dark shade of our table.

"It's complicated, it..." My voice was too shaky to be dignified, so I gave myself a moment before I continued. "It was more of a test to see how I would react."

"A test?" The crinkle between Lux's eyebrows reminded me of the crinkle between Tristan's when he was looking at me in the dark, and I just wanted him to leave me alone. I had crossed an ocean to get away from him and the feelings he forced me to feel, the least he could do was erase himself from my memory and stop following me around with his cigarette smell and his cheekbones that I used to trace with my fingertips whenever we kissed each other goodnight. "That's really sick."

"Not really." I hadn't told Lux about my lifestyle in Paris, or the dangerous games me and my friends liked to play, but needless to say my own personal tragedy was nothing compared to some of the things I'd done to other former members of Les Misérables. "We make – made, made bets and wagers all the time to test each other. Sophie and I bet to see which one of us could sleep with Tristan first, and..."

"And he found out."

"_Did you really sleep with her just to make her look bad?"_

_"Why else would I sleep with her?" The grin on his face was supposed to put me at ease, but my stomach stirred warningly._

_"Because you like her?" My suggestion made him snicker, so I went another route. "Or you don't like me."_

"_You know I do."_

_The wind picked up and brought with it the cologne of impending rain. "You don't show it."_

"_We heard about your little bet and planned something better.__"_

"_We wanted this one to explode in front of everyone, tomorrow morning..."_

"_It sounds perfect...__" I smiled into Tristan's chest and wrapped my left leg around his hip. "What if it's too good to be true?"_

_"Pour vous?" His fingers progressed from my hand to the underside of my bare thigh. "Nothing is too good."_

_"__You're lying to get under my skirt.__" I teased his collarbone with a few well placed butterfly kisses._

_"__Since when do I have to do anything other than get under your skirt to get under your skirt?__"_

_We wound up in a familiar position: the sheets in jumbled disarray at our feet, his lips smoothing the gooseflesh on my inner thighs, my fingers grasping at silk charmeuse pillows and feather light dark hair. It was almost like we had been doing it for years, so easily did my toes curl when his tongue darted and turned and pushed my buttons. In that bedroom on that rainy day, I knew with frightening sureness that my entire life was only a few hours away from changing. Before the first class bell even rang the next day, everyone would see me differently._

_Everything would change._

_I just hoped my wardrobe could handle it._

"It was my own fault," I admitted, picking at my croissant and wishing I hadn't ordered it at all. "I should have seen it coming sooner."

"How was it your fault!" Lux shouted indignantly, startling a nearby patron so thoroughly that she spilled her cup of coffee all over a cute Roberto Cavalli floral skirt. She glared at us both, but I really thought it was her own fault for not having the common sense to put a napkin in her lap to avoid such eventualities. _One should always take care with things of value_, _mère_ had told me one night under the covers. "You made a harmless bet and they turned it into...into..."

"A total travesty? Lux, that's what we _do_." A bird chirped in the bent tree by the street. "Did."

"But that doesn't mean it was your fault."

I thought I could choke on her naïveté. "I had gone unchallenged too long, Lux. I believe it was Thomas Jefferson who said _a little rebellion now and then is a good thing_."

"But they chased you out of France. You're like...Napoleon or something."

"What, short?"

"Yes, but also exiled."

"Actually," I wasn't sure how much of my brilliant plan I was willing to part with so soon after arriving in New York, but I couldn't have my best friend thinking that I _only_ left Paris because I was afraid of the whispers and gossip and wanted to escape all the memories I couldn't seem to stop crying over. "I could have stayed and staged a spectacular coup and made Tristan Marchand eat his words and come crawling on his knees, but..."

"But?"

"But I have some business to take care of."

"Business?" Lux wrinkled her nose, undoubtedly thinking of the kind of business her father did in an office from 9 AM to 5 PM every weekday, except holidays. "You're sixteen."

"So it must be very serious business, then."

Lux leaned forward, her blonde hair catching flecks of gold from where they fell through the gaps in the tree's withering branches. "Like what?"

"_Maman?" I whispered, __reaching for her hand __and her fingers ceased their gentle dance across my scalp._

_I looked up and __saw the vague smile that turned up the right corner of her mouth, where I had always fancied she kept her secret kiss. I never called her maman anymore.__"Oui, bébé?"_

_It was the first question she had asked me since I came home that morning and slammed the front door so hard the window panes in the living room shook in their frames. I had appeared in her bedroom doorway just as she had snapped shut an old box and tucked it into her bedside drawer, and I was probably not supposed to see her doing that because her first reaction was to berate me for sneaking up on her._

_Then, of course, she had seen my face and realized the time and I was in her arms before my knees could hit the ground._

_She hadn't asked questions, hadn't told me that everything would be all right some day if I just dreamed hard enough. She had just held me, taken the headband from behind my ears, and stroked my hair the way any loving mother would. I had forgotten how safe it was to lay with my head in her lap, listening to the little breaths she took and letting my hand curl over the porcelain bone china of her knees. And I remembered that no matter how many times I rolled my eyes at her retreating back or complained to Dorota about the way she treated me or wished that she wasn't ma mère__ and that I could choose anyone else in the entire world to be related to, that she was the one who loved me no matter what my makeup looked like or how short my legs were or how hard I cried into her cashmere shirt or how desperately I clung to the rusching in her favorite Oscar de la Renta skirt._

"_I have to ask you something, and I need you to tell me the truth."_

"_Of course, Ellie." The smile melted away and her red lips frowned at me like they had always done. "What is it?"_

"Qui est mon papa?"

"Je ne sais pas."

"Does he love me?"

"I don't know."

"Will he ever visit me?"

"I don't know."

I learned, very quickly, to stop asking about my papa. The answer was always "Je ne sais pas."

I don't know.

_"Who is Chuck Bass?"_

_The silence in her eyes told me her answer._

"_Mère, s'il te plait." She pried my hand off the rusching of her skirt and moved away from me in one graceful movement I never could have copied. Her hair fell across her back in the prettiest row of curls I had ever seen and the tears started coming easier than ever. "You don't have to tell me who he is to _you_, or why you kept a picture of him in your diary." I felt her turn sharply, and her eyes were no longer silent. "I just want to know who he is. To _me_."_

"_Have you ever met him?" I felt the gooseflesh rise on my arms. "Has he ever talked to you?"_

_I shook my head and called upon my old trick, letting the ends of my hair dangle over my shoulders to make me look as wounded and dejected as possible, then clasped my hands in front of me to appear guiltless. It was Scary Convincing Oscar Winner Face number three, and it was about as petulant and broken as I had ever been able to make it._

"_Eleanor."_

_The gooseflesh puckered to an almost painful degree, and the hairs on the back of my neck joined in and stood on end. Mère__ hadn't called me Eleanor since my christening. __I almost immediately let my shoulders drop and went back to the little girl who had sobbed into her maman's cashmere._

"_You found the diary?"_

_There was a heat in her voice now, and I felt the nerves drain from my body. She wasn't sending me away or ignoring the subject or trying to convince me that there was no diary, that I had clearly made it up in a pathetic cry for help, and that the photograph inside was clearly Photoshopped – and shoddily at that. That alone was more than I had ever hoped for, and the fact that she then sat back down beside me and repositioned my head on her lap was from an entirely different planet. I half expected the floor to open up and swallow us both for this rip in the time-space continuum._

_But the minutes ticked by and the world didn't end. Her fingers re-laced themselves through the short strands of my straight hair and tried effortlessly to curl themselves in its depths. My eyes fell on the closed bedside table drawer and the little gold key next to the Tiffany lamp on its surface, and I couldn't help but wonder if what was in that secret box had something to do with my father or some other secret mère__ had not deigned to tell me._

"_Can't you just tell me, maman?"_

_I felt the sigh in the pit of her stomach. "Non. You're better not knowing."_

_Something in the pit of _my _stomach snapped and that time, it was me who pried myself away from her. The feel of her cashmere against my cheek was suddenly the most offensive feeling in the world, even worse than the look of annoyance in Tristan's eyes or the knowledge that everyone around me knew everything about me before I even got a chance to find out. "You call _this_ better?" I rubbed the tears out of my red-rimmed eyes and allowed my voice to crack when I accused her of lying to me._

_I called ma mère__ a liar to her face and the silence that followed was the loudest silence I have ever heard._

"What happened then?" Lux had practically chewed two incisor-shaped holes in her bottom lip. "Waldorf meltdown?"

"Times two." I nodded, and joined my god sister in a good, healthy shudder. "We said a lot of things, I broke an Italian vase, she told me I would never understand, I asked her why she wouldn't just explain...Dorota tried to intervene and I may have accidentally snapped at her to stay out of it and made her cry. It was bad. We got pretty dramatic before I stormed out and started packing everything I could grab."

"_But, mama. I am not a Waldorf, en vérité, am I? I am really another name that I do not know, non?__"_

"I think I wanted her to run in after me and talk me into staying..."

_The teacher made me move to the back because my surname began with a W, and I was sitting where the B's were meant to sit._

"But it was probably a good idea that she didn't..."

_Waldorfs_, she had told me one night underneath my silk sheets, always want to talk about themselves. The glow from my slowly dying flashlight had illuminated her smile as she stroked my wild brown hair._ If you ever meet one who tells you otherwise, they're lying. Which Waldorfs also like to do, so there's probably an ulterior motive._

'_Why don't you want to talk about yourself? What's the ulterior motive?'_

"I was a wreck, just throwing things around and not thinking clearly..."

_I was a disgrace to my entire immediate _and _extended family._

"_How are you feeling?" asked Nate from the seat beside mine._

_"Inventively homicidal."_

"Well, you wouldn't be a Waldorf if you did!" Lux teased, to lighten the mood. She didn't understand.

_"Well, you wouldn't be a Waldorf if you didn't." I heard the smile in his voice, but I couldn't return it._

Nate's black figure rounded the corner of 74th and Park, and I saw what looked like a cigarette fall under his heel as he raked a shaky hand through his hair.

_**Waldorf**__. You wouldn't be a __**Waldorf**__..._

"I'm not," I whispered, running a hand through my own hair to keep myself from jumping out of my skin. "I'm not a Waldorf."

"What?" Lux almost laughed, I think, but I know for a fact that my eyes were as silent as ma mère's when I asked her about Chuck Bass and who he was to me.

Unlike her, I had the courage to work past the silence and give my friend a straight answer.

"Blair Waldorf isn't my mother."


	14. Dear Diary: Goodnight Little Cherub Boy

_"Goodnight, my little cherub boy  
Sandman's watching over you  
He's gonna make your dreams golden  
'Til the morning comes, darling  
With more adventures for you"_

**CHAPTER FOURTEEN**_  
Goodnight Little Cherub Boy_

Okay, I admit it. I had a little bit of a breakdown today. Nothing serious, just one of your classic dramatic close ups after the hospital door closes and the heroine is left on her own, and her face just breaks down on a single instant and she tries to hold back the tears but they just keep flowing, then there's a camera cut to about three hours when she's fast asleep and the one she loves is sitting by her bed stroking her hand.

Well, Chuck wasn't stroking my hand, he was sort of staring blankly at the wall behind me – I've noticed that he stares blankly at walls a lot rather than actually sleeping.

But it's hard to talk when you don't have anything to say. What do I say? 'I'm sorry.' That won't cut it, because I know he's blaming himself enough for the both of us. After what happened with his mom and the way it ruined his relationship with Bart...this isn't anywhere near the same scenario, obviously, because I'm not dead, but as far as being a useful female member of society...

It was a high risk pregnancy from the beginning, we both knew that, but I couldn't just give up on little Charlie. I wish they would let me at least see him before they take him away. I'm not going to cry again. It's not going to happen. This diary is here to make me feel better, and damn it, I am going to feel better because I'm writing in it.

Yes, I cussed. I know I said I wouldn't cuss anymore because I was having a baby, but...the baby's been had and he's not here to listen, at least not as far as I can see, so damn it damn it damn it. Babies can't read anyway.

They're finally letting me watch TV, but only soothing and comforting things like waterfalls and a Yule log for some reason. Don't ask me why I'm watching a Yule log in the middle of July, I don't run this place. If I did, it would be a lot less depressing and there would be comfier chairs for Chuck to sit in. He's not happy.

He's still staring at the wall. I just tested by waving my hand in front of his face, and I think he's asleep with his eyes open.

No, I did it again and he said "Blair, stop it."

I don't think he understands how infuriatingly boring bed rest is. He hasn't been on it for seven months straight. They won't even let Handsome in here because apparently that's unsanitary, but I say whatever helps the barren patient feel better, right? She can't have any more little sickly babies, so hey, let's deny her access to the only living creature who will lick her face and slobber all over her and okay, I hate it when Handsome does that, but it's better than this absolute nothing I'm doing all day every day in perpetual knowledge limbo.

I am Blair Bass and I am not bitter, I am venting. With good reason.

I asked if I could go to the NICU to see Charlie in his little incubator, but they lied and said they didn't have any wheelchairs. Just because I haven't graduated from Yale doesn't mean I don't have common sense, Doctor Madison, and I can see out the little sliver in my door and I see that empty wheelchair that no one is using, and here I go with the run-on sentences again.

I really need to go back to school. I'm wasting away in this room. I looked at Chuck and he's so tired that I want to hug him. I just want to hold them together. This is the epitome of hell. But it kind of reminded me of the story of Thumbelina and the barleycorn and the tulip? That used to be my favorite story when I was a little girl, after Breakfast at Tiffany's and Roman Holiday and Sabrina and Funny Face and My Fair Lady. After those, was Thumbelina. Well, actually, Snow White but Georgina Sparks ruined that one, didn't she? It'd be nice if I knew I could tell that story to Charlie one day, but...like I said, knowledge limbo.

My hand hurts and I'm going to ask Chuck to make out with me and see if it makes him crack a smile.

As usual,_  
Blair Bass_


	15. Living in Twilight

**A/N:** Another sorta long one...yeesh, it's like I don't know how to be succinct or something. Once again, I thank everyone for their awesome reviews and ask that you keep telling me what you think! 'Everything I do, I do it for you' after all, and I'm so glad everyone seems to be enjoying the ride so far. Let me know if you start to get dizzy! The name of this chapter comes from The Weepies song _Living in Twilight_, which describes a lot of the thoughts running through Elle's head for this one. Enjoy!

xoxo

"_You look darkly on the day with memories to light your way  
A little sad, but it's all right; We are always living in twilight"_

**CHAPTER FIFTEEN**_  
Living in Twilight_

As far back as I can remember – and I can remember sitting on papére's knee at a small white table as Dorota cut slices from a three-tiered birthday cake, the hot summer we spent in Nice before I received my first pony – mère always pulled me out of school on the fourth Thursday of every November. It never mattered if I had an important test, or a class trip to one of my favorite museums, or needed to be in class for a significant assembly or lecture – the fourth Thursday of November was sacred in the Waldorf household.

"School?" she would say every year, tickling my sides and making me cry with laughter. "No. Today's going to be a holiday!"

We were still at the chateau near Lyon when grand-père gave me Casablanca. I spent the morning trotting around the backyard on his snow white back, entertaining grand-père with silly sonnets I had learned from a classmate the day before, while papère made pumpkin pie and mère spent hours stuffing a turkey, mashing potatoes, devilling eggs, rolling bread, and tossing – to my childlike delight – a large Waldorf salad. I believed papère when he told me he had invented it, and no matter how many times mère rolled her eyes and teased him about his 'original' pumpkin pie recipe, I didn't doubt him for a minute.

In the late afternoon, I took a walk with my bunny tucked under my arm, and came to rest in the shade of one of the large apple trees beside Casablanca's new paddock. The branches were laden with ripe and shiny apples but I was too worried about my brand new dress to risk ascending its trunk, so I gathered what treasures had dropped to the dark grass beneath my bare feet and took them to the kitchen door in a large bundle. My bunny hopped behind me, brushing up against my heels and tickling the soles of my feet when mère collected them in a basket and kissed the frayed ends of the black silk ribbons in my ruined curls.

She let me taste the sweet American-style cranberry sauce, which was the biggest treat for me. I swung my legs back and forth and let her spoon morsels into my mouth while Dorota grumbled in her fragmented Polish and ran a finely-bristled brush through my limp elbow-skimming ends, which were streaked and dry from a day spent rolling around in the tender pale yellow embrace of the country sun.

"_You'll spoil her appetite_." Papère took his famous pie out of the oven and the aroma drifted under my nose, slow and luxurious and taunting my stomach with promises of whipped cream and jugs and jugs of all the creamy white milk I could consume.

Mère ignored him and continued to let me lick the sauce off a wooden spoon. "_We're_ _thankful for a spoiled appetite, _non?"

"Oui!" I replied, and she took me upstairs to tie ribbons in my hair.

Everything was 'yes' on the fourth Thursday in November, no matter the silliness of the question or the implausibility of the request, or the practicality in saying 'no'.

Even when we moved nearer to Paris and my schooling became more intense, mère never missed a Thanksgiving. Not even when Dorota was too sick to cook and we had to do everything ourselves in the enormous mint green kitchen we had never manned without supervision. I had only used the sink tap to pour myself glasses of water, or ducked my head into the cupboards to look for hidden treats or fairy princesses living behind the peanut butter jar. I had never basted a turkey before, or lit the stovetop so water could boil, or gotten so thoroughly covered in that same sweet cranberry sauce when the whole lot of it exploded and ruined mère's very favorite pair of Gucci loafers.

We laughed and spent the remaining dinner hours seated at opposite ends of the island counter, picking and choosing our meal selections and making silly calls to Serena in Rio de Janeiro (she had decided coming back to Manhattan with a killer tan was what she wanted to be thankful for), Nate and Aunt Jenny in their chic little loft in Brooklyn (with Lex and Lux shouting nonsense things like 'free Squanto!' and 'turkeys are people too!' in the background), Eric and his brand new husband in Boston (where they had just adopted a boy named Julian), and even grandmamma and saba in their penthouse on the Upper East Side.

Saba said he wished he could give me a big hug and that he loved me, but grandmamma never minced words.

"You need to have a _real_ Waldorf Thanksgiving." She sounded more sentimental than I had ever imagined she could. I pictured her sitting at the head of a long, narrow table with saba at the other end; between them was an elaborate candelabra and an assortment of fine china and all the food mère and I had so clumsily made out of half-written instructions in Dorota's recipe box, and every chair at the table was desolately empty. But then mère and I were there, and we sat down and had pumpkin pie with the blue sky shining in from nearby windows that lit us all in a pale glow as the sun sank lower and lower behind a foreign horizon.

"She is having a real Waldorf Thanksgiving, mother," mère dabbed some cranberry sauce on my nose and leaned in for an Eskimo kiss. "We're having fun."

And we did have fun. The fourth Thursday in November was one of those rare occasions that I knew my mother's mind completely. I could see the cogs spinning and whirling beneath her neatly arranged curls and I predicted her thoughts before she thought them, because her thoughts were my own thoughts. On no other day of the year did we giggle and shriek and run around quite so much, doing whatever we wanted and eating whatever we felt like eating, and always, _always_ saying **yes**.

We watched Roman Holiday on our stomachs in the master bedroom, and Audrey Hepburn's glowing face was nothing compared to the light in ma mère's eyes.

"I'm so thankful he gave you to me," she whispered as the movie fell into a quiet hush of longing and lost chances, and Audrey's face became drawn and closed, and her sweet voice wispy and regretful with the strain of rehearsed words and restrained passions. Mère stroked my hair where it fell around my elbows, and pressed a silent 'I love you' into my temple.

_I will cherish my visit here in memory as long as I live._

I was half-asleep, or maybe I would have learned who 'he' was and why he had to give me to her. But I closed my eyes and nestled in her embrace as the handsome man in the striped suit put his hands in his pockets and walked away from the princess; mère's smooth hair draped over my face when she fell asleep with only a throw pillow to support our combined body weight, and the music tinkled from the speakers – slow and light at first, but louder and sadder as the words THE END splashed across a picture perfect monochromatic scene. Her steady breathing lulled me into my own happy slumber, and I remember dreaming about a Thanksgiving with Indians and pilgrims, except Nate and Jenny were the pilgrims, and Serena was the stylishly dressed Indian squaw.

"Have some more cranberries," they insisted. And I took a third helping

Then I turned fifteen and cut my hair shorter than Princess Ann would have ever attempted. We moved to Paris and our copy of Roman Holiday was lost among the rows and rows of neatly packed and organized boxes. I met Tristan Marchand and we snuck out of my house on the fourth Thursday that November to meet Les Misérables for breakfast at our favorite sidewalk café, where we smoked and laughed and skipped our morning classes just because we knew we could. We wandered through the Jardins du Trocadéro and Tristan took my hand when we reached the Seine. His rough fingers rubbed the valleys between my knuckles, and his mouth moved against mine so lavishly slow that I felt like the only living and breathing girl in Paris.

When I shivered a little in the cool breeze, he took his hat and settled it over my ears. We kissed more along Avenue Henri Martin, and arrived at Janson just in time to set the gossips' tongues ablaze at the nonchalant way we ascended the stairs. We deigned to grace the teachers with our presence for a few hours before we left yet again and entertained ourselves with the tourists coming in and out of the tacky fast food stores and malls along the neon strip of the Champs-Elysées. Tristan bought me a little black dress at every store at Place Vendôme, and I treated myself to a little strand of precious stones at Cartier.

By the time he dropped me off at my door and walked the short distance to his own, I was laden with shopping and practically reflecting light from the hidden sun.

Mère opened the door before I could dig through the Chanel purse I had swiped from her closet, and it was only then that I remembered.

The fourth Thursday in November. The turkey, the cranberry sauce, the laughter and hours of Audrey Hepburn.

I opened my mouth to explain, but she simply glanced from my shopping, to Tristan's hat flattening my bangs to my forehead, to the guilty look on my face with her cold, disappointed eyes. I had ruined her favorite holiday, and she absolutely hated it when anything she loved was tarnished – and when I couldn't smell a simmering dinner roasting and baking in the kitchen, when I saw that Dorota's coat wasn't dangling from the coat rack, when I saw how dark and desolate the television in the sitting room was, I realized I had absolutely demolished our happiest tradition.

"I can have new traditions now," I promised my reflection. I was standing in my new bedroom at Nate and Uncle Jenny's house, staring at my pale reflection in the dressmaker's mirror, and feeling sorry for myself. I was a world away from that doorway in Paris, or the disapproving eyes of my perennially disappointed 'mother', but she haunted my thoughts as I tried to decide whether to go traditional in a pair of perfectly adorable leather champagne/black Prada sling backs, or funky in a brand new set of black suede Bettye Muller cut-out booties.

_Which pair would Blair Waldorf wear?_

I appraised both pairs of shoes and decided they both all but had **I'm a Waldorf **stamped across their soles. I fingered the scalloped lace trim that ran across the bateau neckline of my black dress and wondered if it, too, wasn't a bit too much like what I would have worn to Thanksgiving dinner with her in that gold and mahogany dining room in Paris. Its tiered ruffled skirt reminded me of that third birthday cake, and the large silk bow at my waist only made me feel like a little girl swinging her legs from a chair too big for her and eating cranberries before the turkey was even out of the oven.

"How's it going?"

A blonde head poked its way through the crack in my doorway, and for a brief moment I considered hiding under the bed. Fortunately, when the hinges creaked and the door opened all the way, it was Aunt Jenny who slipped into my room and smiled encouragingly at my choice in Thanksgiving dinner ensemble.

I was, for lack of a better phrase, incredibly _thankful_ that it was Aunt Jenny and not her overly inquisitive and less-than-blunt daughter tossing her blonde locks over her bony white shoulder and asking me how it was going, because Lux had not _shut up_ about our conversation at Cucina Vivolo since I had been stupid enough to confide in her. I was sick of deflecting her questions so no one else could hear what I had discovered in the pages of ma mère's very secret diary, very tired of changing the topic every time she tried to find out exactly what it had been in Tristan and Sophie's stormy eyes that had driven me to hide in a music room for two silent hours.

She always seemed to ask the second question every time Nate was in the room, and I didn't want to see the tremor in his knuckles ever again, or notice the gray in his light brown hair or the way it thinned on the top. The tic in his jaw and the stiffness in his back as his breaths came in short, grasping huffs were more than enough to make me afraid of another silent treatment like the one he had given me after my near-death on Park Avenue. So, I always asked about _her_ friends, _her_ school, _her_ life in all its beautiful simplicity, so that Nate could relax and enjoy the feeling of his plush leather chair against the tense and angry muscles in his back.

Aunt Jenny didn't bring him aspirin to ease his stress headaches, or even offer to rub his neck as I could vividly remember doing so often in the past. Instead, she locked herself in her studio room and drew for hours. Or maybe she just sat and thought about drawing – usually she wanted everyone to look at her designs and give their honest opinion on cut, or hem length, or sleeve design, or appliqués, but I had yet to see a single first draft of a single rough sketch of even a vaguely planned skeleton of a piece. I knew she was so wrapped up in her odd talkative silence that she would never notice the question even if she was around to hear it asked, because she was always going on about what we should do that night or the next day or the next afternoon and with whom and for how long and what fun we would have.

We had yet to follow through with any of her plans.

Lex wasn't a danger, either, because he was almost always out with friends or holed up in his room for hours on end. I thought I smelled marijuana on my way to the bathroom one late night, and hoped he wasn't stupid enough to light a joint under his parents' own roof. Then again, maybe he was doing it to _get_ his parents under the same roof and unite against a common enemy.

...Then again, he wasn't that smart. I loved him, but he wasn't _that_ smart.

It wasn't only Nate reliving my last few days in France, or Lux blabbing my theory to him that worried me. We were due at grandmamma's penthouse at 6 o' clock for the traditional Waldorf Thanksgiving dinner, and I didn't need her passing the cranberry sauce and thoughtlessly asking "So, Elle, why do you think your mom isn't your mom?" in front of every member of my supposed family, Lily van der Woodsen, Eric or his husband Colin, Uncle Aaron, or even the _maid_ because that would likely have me sent back to France on the first available flight.

People would try to cover it up, make up paper thin explanations crafted out of salty grains of truth, and ma mère would never look at me again.

The whole reason I was in New York and thousands of miles away from home on the fourth Thursday in November was so I could meet my father, and perhaps learn who my _real_ mother was, and _maybe_ even find a new home in a place where I belonged, and could finally let myself feel love without kicking and screaming and choking myself to death in the struggle to earn it from someone who didn't even owe it to me. Keeping my suspicions and questions a closely-guarded secret was the key to getting everything I had ever dreamed of – meeting Chuck Bass, finding my father, and finally beginning down the path to the rest of my life.

It was a mission that required delicacy, careful planning, lots of lists, and an extreme amount of discretion.

And I had confided in _Lux, _who was even worse than I was at keeping titillating details locked away behind her teeth. And within twenty-four hours of getting off the plane! It had been the desperate act of a lonely girl who didn't know what she was doing or what her place was, who felt lost and needed direction and had horrible judgment because she was in mourning for a life she had never had. It was a mistake that I could _not_ make again.

Whether I was really a Waldorf or not, I believed what mère told me in the shadows my flashlight cast beneath the covers: Waldorfs may lie to get their way, stomp their sharp stiletto heels into the heads of lesser people in a never-ending quest for a fairytale ending, and use their wit and cleverness to aid them where they lacked easy gracefulness or a sunny disposition – but they were never, ever, not even for a fraction of a second, weak.

No matter how many times Lux tugged and prodded and pleaded, I could not yield any more information. Not without incontrovertible evidence, the kind I could only get from the people who knew the secret and didn't want to share it. I would have to be sneaky, which was fine with me...after all, I had been _raised_ a Waldorf, and the art of a well-structured sentence was not completely lost to my overly thoughtful tongue.

"Elle?" Jenny had crossed the length of the room and was standing behind me, adjusting the bow on my belt and tucking my hair behind my ears.

"I'm fine."

I shifted uncomfortably, because the last time someone had fiddled with my hair in front of a mirror it had been at the start of a sunny day, when the world held promise and I was a queen not yet in exile.

She smiled and looked at my bare feet, undoubtedly thinking the tug of my teeth on my lower lip had everything to do with my wriggling toes. "Dilemma?"

"Just solved it, I think," I frowned, reaching for a daring pair of lace-up Christian Louboutin pumps with 5 inch spike heels. I had bought them one night with mère's credit card after she forbade me to even so much as try them on ever again, and worn them to one of her charity galas purely out of spite. She loathed them, and looked at them the same way she looked at Tristan or anything neon green. I laced them up with extra vigor, remembering the bright star of contempt in her eyes and hoping it was flashing at me from across the Atlantic Ocean.

She couldn't tell me what to do anymore, and I didn't have to pretend to care what she wanted. All I had to worry about was what I wanted, and I wanted nothing more than to complete the mission I had been quietly campaigning for ten long years.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Of course." There was a waver in the sweet lilt of her overly sugary voice, and I finally heard the sound of her heart cracking beneath hastily applied bandages. The thought of asking her why this was the first day I had so much as seen her and Nate look at each other crossed my mind as quickly as I shook it off and dragged my meandering thoughts onto the straight and narrow path that would, with any luck, answer the riddle that was my enigmatic life.

"You were there when I was born, right?"

I knew the story well, could mouth it in synch with whatever sentimental voice so happened to be telling it for the five hundredth time, could almost envision the events of the day in digitally clear detail through the eyes of every spectator I knew had witnessed my birth day. Uncle Nate had run down the street to a video store and paid too much for a back room storage copy of _Breakfast at Tiffany's_, just so mère could hear the angelic strains of Moon River over what she called the incessant technical mumbo jumbo of the flock of doctors; grandmamma had downed three cocktails in the waiting room before saba cut her off and nudged her into the delivery to hold mère's hand; papère and grand-père Skyped from the chateau and watched me come into the world on an ultra bright widescreen, shouting out words of encouragement and threatening to sue the doctors if she and I both didn't emerge from the delivery room completely healthy.

Everyone had their own take on the day, but that's not what I wanted them to tell me about...I wanted to hear the stories from their lips again, so I could piece them together and riddle out any inconsistencies they didn't want me to notice, or perhaps I would see the lies on the lips of those who didn't know how to make their mouths match their eyes. Broaching a familiar and much beloved subject was my best bet if I wanted to avoid suspicion.

And, just as I had known she would, Jenny spun the familiar silky tale about how she had rushed out of a meeting with a very important buyer from Bergdorf Goodman, leaving everything but her cell phone and the cup of coffee she had been pretending to sip behind. When a cab proved too difficult to hail in the mid-day traffic rush, she had simply removed her kitten heels and ran to the hospital, spilling her coffee all over her pricey Badgley Mischka handbag and almost tripping over a large greyhound tied to a parking meter.

I listened, fiddling with my hair and wondering if this wasn't such a good idea after all. The complete lack of artfully hidden information in her nostalgic smile frustrated me so much that I felt the questions bubbling up in my throat, begging for me to part my teeth and allow them to burst across my lips – _why didn't you tell me that Blair Waldorf isn't my mother? Do you know who my real mother is? What about my father? Is he Chuck Bass? Why did mère hide it from me? You have to tell me the whole story because I'm so confused. I know they were married, but did they love each other? Did he cheat on her? Did she cheat on him? Why did she raise me if she isn't my mother? And, I ask this again because it is really vital, who __**is**__ my real mother and why didn't she want me? I have all these theories and questions and I can't sort through them all, and I just need someone to tell me before I start jumping to conclusions and explode into a million pieces and die before I ever know the truth!_

Somehow, I felt that would be the opposite of productive. In fact, my whole plan was shaping up to be the opposite of productive.

"Why do you ask?" she straightened the hem of my skirt so that it lay just so over the semi-opaque asymmetrical patterns on my black tights.

'_Because I'm grasping at straws,'_ I admitted to myself.

"No reason," I shrugged and pulled my vintage 2007 Yves Saint Laurent patent leather crocodile-patterned tote over my shoulder. "I've just been thinking a lot lately."

"Thinking?" Aunt Jenny ran one last smoothing hand through my lifeless muddy bob and sighed when it didn't fluff up at the ends. "Don't hurt yourself."

I offered a wafer thin smile at her stale joke, and used every ounce of my acting skills to keep my eyes from rolling in their sockets. If there was one thing that bothered me other than polyester, poorly applied foundation, and girls who thought their poorly faked designer accoutrements fooled people, it was overused American laugh-track sitcom jokes.

"Bad joke, I know," at least she had the grace to admit it. I let her slip an arm around my shoulders for a quick hug, but I wasn't quite ready to let her steer me towards the door and out into the rest of the day. There were too many things she had to know that she thought I would never find out, and if I could even catch so much as a glimmer of one of them, it would make the rest of my day seem infinitely less daunting. I had a lot of people to interrogate, after all, and not a lot of casual alone-time to do it.

"Come on. Car's waiting."

"Wait," I dug my sharp heels into the plush carpet and caught her around the sharp bone in her wrist. "There's something else."

I remembered Nate's white-knuckled hold on mère's dining room door handle, and felt my fingers tighten around her. Had he told her about the crumpled old picture at the bottom of my monogram suitcase? Did she know the desperation in my eyes when I'd clasped my hands together in prayer and asked to know _everything_ he could tell me about the people in that photograph and who they had been and who the dark-haired man was to me? Was he the darkness in my eyes, the sharp line of my jaw, the shrewd slant of my brow?

And, if he was, _why_ had he sent me to live with Blair Waldorf?

From what I had read in ma mère's diary, I had patched together those theories and questions that I couldn't sort through, but the conclusions I wanted to jump to were just on the other side of that closed bedroom door, and if I didn't prod and poke and dig my way closer to some kind of vague truth, my personal crusade just might turn into a Holy War. I had hoped that glimmer would wink at me from behind a dark shadow in the depths of my false history, but if it would not be coaxed out by a flourish of my bottom lip or a patient attempt at being incognito, I would just have to sink my nails in and drag it into the light.

"What is it, Ellie?" I thought I heard a thin patch in the sugar coat that was her voice, and I resolved to punch through it and get to the creamy caramel center.

"You know why I came here." It wasn't a question, because I was finished with questions. They hadn't gotten me anywhere yet, why would they suddenly do me the courtesy after ten long years? "Don't you?"

The way her throat didn't move when she cleared it told me she did.

"You were having a hard time with school, and you and Blair weren't really getting along..."

"And you know why." My fingers unfurled and she drew away so quickly, with her shoulders drawn so far up to her ears, that I thought she looked like she wanted to sprout wings and fly right through the open third-story window. "I know you do, and keeping it from me isn't going to make things any better."

I had once demanded something from Aunt Jenny, one Easter at Les Trois Vallées. Mère had gone upstairs to take a hot bath and relax with a bottle of red wine, Nate had taken Lex and Lux to a bunny slope for a few hours of torturous freezing cold 'fun' that I could not imagine them enjoying, and Jenny had volunteered to, what she called, _baby-sit_ me by the roaring fire in the lobby. Allergic to cold in a way that amused everyone but me, I sat imperiously in the largest winged-back chair in the room, bundled so thoroughly in scarves and winter clothing that I resembled a disgruntled marshmallow more than a well-brought up fairy princess.

"_Get me hot chocolate,"_ I lifted my chin and glared at the fire for not being warm enough.

"_Say please,"_ she instructed, setting down her pencil on top of her most recent design idea.

"_Non."_ I lifted my chin higher and curled my lip the way I often did to show distaste. After all, I was cold and hot chocolate was a basic need. I shouldn't have to say _please_.

"_Unless you say please, you're not getting anything."_

So, I bit down on my pride and grumbled a reluctant, "_Please_."

"Please."

Her brow smoothed and the tautness of her lip gave way to a gentle downward slope that set the damned space behind my eyes ablaze.

I had been turned down in this request often enough to expect a shake of the head, a furtive glance in a direction that led nowhere while my request was carefully averted and shunted aside somewhere beneath a rug or inside an ornately crafted vase. Even a disappointed sigh and a lecture about how I really shouldn't be poking my nose into things I didn't understand would have been more expected than what Aunt Jenny did next.

"I'm not telling you anything about Chuck Bass." There was no anger in the way she touched her fingers to mine, no disheartened upturn of her lips or sympathetic twitch in her temple. She pronounced every consonant with the precision of a professionally trained vocalist, with such care and intent behind every syllable that I couldn't allow myself to doubt her. "And neither will anyone else."

The imprint of her solid lips on my cheek seared like a branding iron.

_Give up._ The flames licked.

_It's hopeless._ They smoldered, spreading to my chest and clenching my heart in a white-hot fist hold.

I nodded when she told me to come down the car whenever I was ready, but I didn't listen to words she didn't say. The reflection of my dark eyes met their animal twins flaming in the shadow of my narrowed eyebrows, and the world dressmaker's mirror told me what I already knew to be true: it was probably hopeless, and I probably should have given up all those years ago in the diamond light of papère's library – if I had slipped away without that picture, without the alien arrangement of letters in my mind's eye, I would have been happy to be a Waldorf in the blissful shade of an apple tree that dropped its blessings at my feet.

But I couldn't. It was time to climb that tree and rip the fruit of knowledge from its branches, even if the climb destroyed my freshly manicured nails.


	16. The House of Yes

**A/N:** I had a weird Phantom Menace moment at the end of this one. ;) Thanks for your reviews and enjoy!

xoxo

**CHAPTER SIXTEEN**_  
The House of Yes_

I was the last member of our party to step through the elevator's gilded doors, and we were far from the first group to arrive for Thanksgiving dinner, but the click of my heel sounded thunderous when it hit the glossy white-and-black checkered marble floors. The penthouse of 1136 5th Avenue was nothing like I had imagined it would be, and yet it was everything I expected. The rich wood walls that told the untold tale of decades, polished to a pretty shine that glinted across the granite tabletop of a pretty French Rococo style console. In its center was an autumnal bouquet of red, bronze, and orange, bursting with pale roses, Matsumoto asters, Cymbidium orchids, and the obligatory chrysanthemums; dotted between the flora were magnolia and preserved oak leaves, seeded eucalyptus and faux bittersweet, all arranged around two burning burgundy pillar candles.

A small tug in my chest made me wish Dorota was there to see it.

Before I could miss her too much, the clicking of another pair of heels drew my attention to the tall and slender woman striding towards me. In a rare moment of social gracelessness, the original Eleanor Waldorf, resplendent in a pearly white pure silk top with rosette detail at the left cap-sleeved shoulder, let out a welcoming peal of delight and allowed her lips to stretch fully across her teeth. Her black lace pencil skirt matched my own gold dress with black silk overlay; I silently cursed myself for not listening to my instincts.

I looked every inch the Waldorf grandmamma pretended I was when she wrapped her arms around me and kissed my cheeks in the way I was used to. I returned the favor with a small 'bonjour' and watched the light caramel in her eyes turn positively butterscotch as she ran her smooth, noble hands down the lengths of my skinny twigs for arms. The prelude to a smile in the upright corners of her lips told me that she was pleased with what she saw, even when she touched two blasé fingers to the ends of my perhaps-too-trendy bobcat haircut. Everything with Eleanor was timeless grace and perfect posture, tiny bites and dainty sips. That I passed her test in my sky-high Christian Louboutins was a mystery in and of itself, but the way she kissed my cheeks two more times as though we were meeting on the steps of the Théâtre Graslin really threw me for a loop.

I realized, belatedly, that not a single stitch of my clothing came from Waldorf Designs. If I hoped she wouldn't notice, I was a deliriously stupid wishful thinker.

"You're so thin," she gushed. From another overbearing grandmother, it would be said after two or three disappointed tsks and a shake of the head. From grandmamma, it was the ultimate compliment, beating other common contenders such as 'I love you' and 'you are such a giving, wonderful soul'. It was her stamp of approval, and I couldn't help but wish I could have her all to myself for the remainder of the evening. Once Eleanor Rose kissed you four times and complimented your silhouette, nothing was too ludicrous to ask.

But I still felt the imprint of Aunt Jenny's branding kiss, and it forced me to draw back with a grateful smile.

Nate rounded the corner into what I assumed was the dining room, while Lux wandered toward the curving staircase in pursuit of the bathroom, and Lex ducked his head to avoid his mother's eye when Julian Ashcroft-Van der Woodsen set down his premature glass of red wine and began a careless lope toward them. My saba emerged from between two frenzied cater-waiters (attending to one of my grandmamma's affairs was no doubt the most pressure they'd felt in their short lives, outweighing whatever college research papers or dissertations they'd been forced to write before taking their ranks among the faceless black-vest wearing masses) and opened his arms for me to dip down into. It was a short journey, because even in my five inch heels, the shiny top of saba's bald head came up to the bottom of my nose.

"Oh, kiddo," I could have sworn a shaft of light flowed from between his teeth, so happy was he to have me there in his embrace. "You're finally here."

The feeling I had felt upon my arrival in New York – the sensation of belonging and knowing that things would solve themselves eventually as long as I roamed the city's streets – paled in the presence of saba's unconditional acceptance, and the warmth that spread from his fingertips infected me the way Manhattan had already done. No more would I stare at my reflection in the mirror and wonder how to make things right, because they _were_ right. Even if I had been naturally born into the Waldorf family, Cyrus Rose wouldn't have been my biological grandfather. The bond we shared was forged from years of Parisian Passover Seders and bounteous Hanukah celebrations alongside Christmas trees in papère's chateau. He loved me not because were supposed to be related, but because he had played a pivotal supporting role in my upbringing.

We were quite a pair, his mismatched tie and jacket beside my prim and proper lace, but we strolled into the dining room on each other's arms anyway.

It actually wasn't a dining room, but a neatly designed living room with a large dining table at its center. Groups of people milled in front of the windows and around the rearranged furniture, all dressed in finery befitting a nighttime feast. A golden light fell down from the pearl chandelier in the ceiling, sideways from the crackling fire in the ornate fireplace. I recognized the willowy woman beside the chaise lounge as Lily van der Woodsen, not from the chic platinum blonde bun at the nape of her unwrinkled neck, but from the freeness of her smile. It was the same smile Serena always gave me right before she pounced and showered me with gifts, kisses, and shrieks of joy.

At her side, in a gray Royal Underground hooded blazer I knew grandmamma could not approve of, was Lex's friend Teddy. Something in the set of his jaw as he listened to whatever Uncle Eric was saying, in the way the nearby firelight flickered and cast deep shadows in the hollows of his cheekbones and in the cave between his eyebrows and thick black eyelashes...something about him gave me pause. If nothing else, I liked his slightly askew bow tie.

Saba led me away from their little party, which included Uncle Eric's husband Colin Ashcroft and a tall, dark girl I couldn't pin a name to, and into the fold of Uncle Aaron's sideways grin and customary clap on the shoulder. "Look who's here!" he winked, and spoke to a party member behind him. "This is my niece, for all intents and purposes. Ellie, meet my other sort-of-niece."

A face I more than recognized appeared around his sharply-cut shoulder, and for a moment I was utterly star struck. The long, unfettered waves of flaming red hair paired with the most unapologetically ivory white skin and wide, round eyes as blue and clear as pure crystal. Her full pouty lips and mile long freckled legs had graced the pages of every top fashion magazine in both Europe _and_ the States, not to mention she had donned some of the most expensive creations by the most exclusive designers on the most photographed runways in the world. New York. Rome. Paris. London. Milan. Tokyo. She had walked everywhere and posed for my absolute favorite Dolce & Gabbana eyewear campaign (which depicted her and an assortment of beefcake men locked in a dusty library with only books, eyeglasses, and sizzling seductive poses to entertain them!).

I was too diminutive in stature to ever dream of sauntering down a catwalk, draped in the finest breathing artwork of the ages, but that didn't mean I couldn't be fast friends with someone who did!

"Scarlett Rose!"

Her famous smile made her button nose turn up ever-so-slightly at the sides. "Technically, it's Scarlett Kennedy, but I don't mind. Either one."

At just 17, she was one of the youngest Americans to ever be called a 'super model'. Rumor had it Victoria's Secret was courting her to be one of their Angels as soon as she celebrated her next birthday. I had never felt the urge to absolutely faint out dead cold on the ground at a crowded function before, but her presence positively shocked and scared me. In all my years attending mère's dinners, parties, dinner parties, charities, galas, and charity galas, I had never been so excited to meet a single person in my life.

(Not counting Chuck Bass.)

"I saw you walk for Christian Lacroix last autumn!" I gushed.

I was _gushing_. What would I do next? Debase myself and ask for an autograph?

"You're Eleanor Rose's granddaughter?" I nodded. No reason to tell a perfect famous stranger my sordid family details. "I'm sure you were in the front row."

"Second," I corrected glumly, remembering the shame all too well. It had been an amazing show, but it probably would have been even more amazing from the _front_. "But when you came out in that big seashell halter dress with the floral underskirt and your hair in those amazing braids, I think I might have seen Jesus."

Saba let out a startled "Elle!" and Aaron snorted into his own untimely glass of red wine (why was everyone already drinking?), but I was fortunately saved from further reprimand by grandmamma tapping her salad fork against the empty glass beside her empty plate. The cater-waiters were standing by with trays of sumptuous Thanksgiving treats, and no guest had to wait for her announcement to know that it was time to eat. En masse, everyone moved to their chairs, twittering and promising to finish half-complete conversations during dessert and coffee. I noticed Teddy looking quite intensely at me, but he looked down at his brown-and-white leather Gucci lace-ups when Scarlett and I moved to the other side of the table to take our seats.

I ignored the achingly familiar inward slope of his dark knitted brows and turned to Scarlett to discuss John Galliano's increasing brilliance at length. I felt eyes on the back of my neck and, thinking Teddy was glaring again, I turned to shoot him a 'what the hell?' look only to meet the lighter warning in Aunt Jenny's drawn gaze. Nate was beside her with his chair turned slightly toward the businessman on his other side, both of his hands in plain view on the ruffled tablecloth.

I looked blankly back at her, wondering if she thought I was interrogating world famous supermodel and universally beloved runway darling Scarlett Rose about my family tree.

She apparently read the 'be serious' quirk in my left eyebrow and turned back to her plate of appetizers.

Throughout the main course, I entertained myself by listening to Scarlett's fascinating stories about the glamorous life she lead. I also did what I did best as a student of drama and carefully observed each and every one of grandmamma's guests to ascertain their individual character. In this quiet scrutiny, I noticed a few glaringly obvious things about Aunt Jenny and my godfather that I should have taken the time to appreciate in the days I had been living in their townhouse.

Number one, her slim legs were crossed away from him and the shoulder nearest him was hunched inward. She was even eating her turkey and stuffing with her left hand, just to close herself off even more. Number two, Nate hadn't spared one word on her since we had arrived, and the third finger of his left hand was unrepentantly bare.

It was like they weren't even pretending to be married anymore, not even to please their friends.

Jenny also studiously avoided outright verbal or optical contact with her son, sitting next to Julian, whose wholesome American combination of swept-back dusty blond hair and charming pearly white smile was almost too princely to believe. Where Jules was the epitome of poise and leisurely gentility, Lex was more reluctant to lean in to their casual conversation, flashing the occasional half-hearted grin and letting loose a few warm chuckles from the bottom of his throat, but never touching or so much as inclining his head to his neighbor.

Lux was beside her older brother, an elbow on the table and her chin on her fist as she stared dreamily at the milky sheen of the pearl chandelier. I knew she was bored, because she was always bored in the middle of society, where she was required to sit politely with her hummingbird lips sealed tight and her hands folded politely over her bony knees. If I could read her thoughts, which I sometimes could because they had a tendency to overlap my own, I would wager she was imagining herself anywhere else – skating in the park, perhaps, or maybe just sitting in her room with a good book and a rugged rock opera blasting holes in her speakers. I offered her a playful wink from my repertoire of well-rehearsed facial expressions, but perhaps out of spite for the way I had shut her out of my mission on Sunday, she just pursed her lips and shoveled a large spoonful of potato salad down her throat.

Dessert rolled around, and among the pastries and sugary treats was the pumpkin pie papère so lovingly called his own. I wondered if he and grand-père had shared a romantic Thanksgiving alone in the private alcove of their chateau, and decided to call them the next time I had more than a few disjointed moments to myself.

The next time I felt that prickling on the back of my neck that meant someone was watching me, it turned out to be Eric and Colin, both with identical looks of delight on their face. Our big bear hugs and warm greeting kisses were marred only by the sight of Aunt Jenny crossing her arms in my peripheral vision, but I chose to ignore her disapproving gaze and plan my next method of interrogation. After all, she couldn't stop me from talking to _everyone_ just because she assumed that I was going to constantly ask the very questions she was afraid of me constantly asking.

Of course, I would be asking those questions constantly, but she still had no right to stop me!

So she said that no one else would tell me about Chuck Bass either, with her positive fingers arching to her palm and pulling taut the skin on her hands. So she patronizingly thought that one parentally charged tone of voice would stop me from doing what I wanted to do. Jenny couldn't predict the future, as far as I knew, and my favorite 'uncles' in the world might be in a more charitable mood.

They had never denied me anything I'd asked for, after all, not even that spur-of-the-moment trip to Versailles when I was five. Colin had taken time off from the ACLU and treated Eric to a cozy stay in Monaco, and they had elected to take their sweet time boating up the French Riviera to stop around Nice and pay us a visit. During a rather rigorous game of make-believe, Colin had registered some doubt at the validity of my claim to the throne, and we had agreed to travel to the Palace Château de Versailles to ask one of the tour guides to crown me in Marie Antoinette's bedroom.

Mère had laughed at us when we told her our plan, but 8 hours and 23 minutes later as we dwindled low on petrol and coasted up Avenue de Paris toward the looming behemoth that had once been the center of political power in France, a classical testament to a time long gone trapped in the urban sprawl that sprang up around it, she was stifling yawns instead of chuckles. To me, though, the car ride was a blazing campaign to what was really just a big castle to play dress up in; when we got our tour guide to anoint me with the tiara Colin had bought at a souvenir shop on one of our brief pit stops, the whole room laughed a little and called me _the little princess_ the rest of the tour.

Another 8 hours and 30 some odd minutes later, as mère carried me over the threshold of our own palatial chateau, I grumbled something about a bedtime story and Eric read me _Le Petit Prince_. It was the start of a long and storied love affair between me and the written word; in a way, I had Uncle Eric to thank for all the discoveries I had made in my life that otherwise would have stayed in the shadows of a forgotten bookshelf.

Maybe he would prove useful once again.

"Salut!" I chirped, sounding much too cheerful for a girl who had called him sobbing and begging for a place to stay before Nate and ma mère came around and agreed to let me stay at the Archibald townhouse. I chose to ignore the way his mouth pulled back and Colin's right eyebrow went up in synch with the downward movement of his left, and kissed their cheeks before lifting my glass of Chateau d'Yquem to them and silently toasting.

"Comment ça va?" I asked after they'd finished sipping, and my answer was an energetic retelling of his most recent civil rights victory over a group of corporate bad guys and their discrimination against and harassment of a pregnant employee. Watching Eric get stirred up about his work gave me hope for my mission – when he got off on one of his legal tangents, and waved his glass around with little disregard for its contents like he had begun to do, it always took his brain five or six seconds to simmer down and let his mouth do the artful word sculpting. In the courtroom and out, his passion was a juggernaut, and that suited my purpose just fine.

When Aunt Jenny disappeared into the lobby to say goodnight to a departing guest, I made my move.

"At the same time, you have to think that she had a responsibility to tell them about it, if it was going to interrupt her work like that." The sentence I had stepped over winded to a halt and I released a melancholy sigh to ease him into a more mellow, philosophical mood. "I don't understand it when people keep very important secrets, so I can understand why the boss was so angry about being kept in the dark…"

Eric's nails clinked against the side of his glass and he starched the bottom of his smooth chin. "Stop it with the Oscar Award winning little facial expressions, Ells. You may be a good actress, but I'm an attorney."

"I'm beginning to think I'm _not_ a very good actress..." I mumbled into the lipstick stain on the rim my half-empty glass. "Okay, you know me; I have a favor to ask."

"As usual," even though he wasn't biologically related to Julian, I could see his adopted son in the genteel way he teased me with a vague gesture in his eyes and an irreverent hand in undoubtedly expensive lining of his trouser pocket. The jacket he wore was from another suit, as Uncle Eric so often liked to do, and it wrinkled perfectly over the slope of his forearm. "What would you like for Christmas, then? We already have your present all wrapped up but, of course, we'll buy you another one."

"Awwwww." Momentarily distracted, I cycled through my wish list for that year and missed the silent conversation my uncles were having with their eyes.

I settled on a jaunty fedora with beady little Swarovski crystals sewn in to the hatband. I would never wear it, but it would look very cute dangling from one of my bedposts...in my room...back in Paris. Sparkling in the gauzy sunlight from my eastern facing windows when the time of day was right, glittering with the reflections of my shaded lamps when the night dwindled into early morning... Just as I changed my mind about that very poor decision, Colin put a calloused hand on my shoulder and squeezed with his knuckles, the way an adoring gay uncle should.

"We can't gift wrap Chuck Bass, I'm afraid."

I looked back and forth between their golden brown, unnaturally passive faces, and huffed.

"How does everyone know I'm going to ask that!"

Grandmamma blinked at me from over saba's head and I pursed my lips together in a demure show of apology.

Eric seized my rare display of compliant silence and moved the hand from his pocket to rest on my other shoulder. "We've all got our ways."

"Apparently you also all have secrets to keep. From _me,_ specifically."

How much had Nate and Jenny already managed to tell them? Or, what if this went much deeper and had everything to do with ma mère. How she managed to utterly ruin my life from 3,628 miles away was simultaneously a marvel and the biggest frustration of my life. I barely resisted the childlike urge to stamp my foot, mainly because it would hurt like hell in my heels, but also because petulance definitely didn't go with my complexion under the glow of tender orange firelight.

I shrugged them both off and let the bones of my wrists crush against my hips. "You know I hate secrets."

"I know." Uncle Eric moved closer when the damp sound of Jenny's kitten heels digging into the carpet drew near. "I also know you'll come to 13 Washington Square North one day after school under the pretense of watching a couple of movies with Jules. Oh, and baking us some of those cookies Dorota makes."

I wanted to ask if the cookies were part of the pretense because I'd never managed to successfully replicate them without at least three 'warm-up' batches, and I doubted I could do it with that little in an entirely foreign kitchen, but Jenny was making a beeline to our little triangle and I didn't have time to waste.

"Why?"

He lowered his voice even more and pretended to be admiring my dangling earrings.

"Some of us don't like secrets any more than you do."

Probably to avoid the intention in my surprised squeal that meant I wanted to jump on him and give him an embarrassing hug for the record books, Uncle Eric pulled Colin toward Jenny and intercepted her purposeful saunter before I could be caught in a line of fire._ I knew he wouldn't let me down_, I set my glass down on a passing cater-waiter's tray without looking to see if that's what it was intended for and moved out of the living room's pale blush.

I had never been inside the penthouse before, obviously, and since I had finished my meal and possibly gotten my very first lead(!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) I desperately wanted to explore. I had grown up hearing about ma mère's childhood inside its walls, and I remembered her telling me about the spectacular views from her bedroom windows. _It isn't personal_. I tried to convince myself of that as I ascended the curving carpeted staircase and looked up at the unlit hallway that waited for me at the summit.

Polite clinking glasses and cultured laughter that never rose above nasally chirrups fell into my old companion, silence, when the first shadow fell across the lines of my dress and bled its fine lace detailing into a solid shroud. A quick look back down into the almost seasonal blaze emanating from the temporary dining room told me that my footsteps had gone uncolored; I was all alone on the second floor, free to let my hair dangle in my eyes and walk with my shoulders hunched forward as I looked for a closed door that might call to me.

Or at least, the me who liked to dance in the echoes of ma mère's own uncolored footprints.

Maybe the light from the stars would hit me in such a way that the door would mistake me for its old tenant and warm itself to beckon me in.

The pictures on the walls were less streamlined and soulless than the ones that decorated grandmamma's foyer and living room. There was no overpriced art, just undervalued life dangling from nails and swinging at me to win my attention. There were wedding photos outside one door, and I saw ma mère in the background laughing as a bottle of champagne overflowed into outstretched flutes. Beside those were snapshots from around the world – grandmamma and saba standing outside a temple in China, their bare feet making me wonder if perhaps saba had drugged her beforehand; grandmamma at the base of a mountain I knew she had not climbed in those stylish pumps; saba bending forward to kiss the Wailing Wall while grandmamma no doubt stood by in white linen and distaste for the idea of pressing her lips to something so filthy-looking.

Another door bore no special markings, and I bypassed it in favor of the one at the end of the hall. Dominating much of the space beside its jamb was a portrait of ma mère as a little girl, all chestnut ringlets and a navy blue sundress. Beneath her polished frame was a smattering of little photographs – me in a ballet studio, a pink tutu fanning out around my twiggy little legs; me astride Casablanca in my first try at show jumping, me being nuzzled by my pony as I held the first place trophy in my greedy little hands. I smiled vaguely at that lost world, and then wondered at the other photos of a dark-haired little boy opening Christmas presents and sucking his thumb in an ornate playpen that looked like it was situated in front of one of the living room windows.

The door was partially open, but I was still surprised to see Lex's friend Teddy sitting cross-legged on a silky down comforter. The sloppy top of his dark head was all it took for me to recognize him, even without the flickering sparks his cigarette lighter spurted forth with all his unsuccessful attempts to light the cigarette between his teeth. I pressed my left palm to the light switches and watched the room glimmer to life with more success than the end of Teddy's curling cigarette.

Blue walls.

Her walls had been blue in Manhattan, too, the same shade as her bedrooms at the chateau, at Marnes-la-Coquette, the house in Paris...right down to the portrait of Audrey Hepburn hung dead-center above her large bed. The views she had so often mentioned were hidden behind drawn curtains, and most of the little furniture was covered with frail white sheets to keep the dust away. I had never taken grandmamma for a sentimentalist, but I had to smile at the fact that even mère's fabric picture wall remained in tact.

Once I walked toward the bed and let my eyes wander over the ceiling and back at the blue, blue walls, the painting of the woman in the blue dress caught a cough in the column of my throat. I remembered the same woman, donned in purple and modeling on the wall of my bathroom at Marnes-la-Coquette. Marie Antoinette, I'd fancied, approving of my beauty rituals even if my hair didn't curl exactly as much as Dorota wanted it to.

"What are you doing here?" Teddy fumbled with his lighter and I watched it slip through his hands and fall with a clunk into his lap.

"I could ask you the same question." I eyed his hooded blazer and decided that even though it wasn't exactly what one might call fashionable, it was still fairly cool. I imagined he wore it because he frowned upon traditional high society life, but the fact that his unresponsive cigarette was actually a hand-rolled joint dispelled that theory before it even grew wings. "You know they're going to smell that, don't you?"

It too slipped through his fingers, but because he deliberately twitched his thumb and let it slide across his palm unregulated. I winced as it rolled across the cream bedspread and left its faint scent in the finely weaved fabric of the aged silk, but decided since no one was really using the bedroom anyway, it didn't matter. "Didn't really want to smoke it anyway..."

"Uh huh," I made a vague noise of affirmation, studying the dark hairs that fell across his forehead.

He rested his elbows on his knees and stared unseeingly at the light crown molding.

"What tears you away from Scarlett Rose?" An undulating ember of interest kindled dark glassy firewood, and I suddenly realized why he had been staring at me so intensely before dinner – or, so intensely at my left shoulder, rather.

"A healthy interest in finding all the possible fire exits."

"Upstairs?"

"Touché." I granted him a yielding smile and offered him an upturned palm. "We've met, but not officially. Elle Waldorf."

His fingers touched mine as delicately as the hem of my dress grazed my knee. "Teddy Bass."

It was my turn to stare from under the umbrella of a finely manicured brow.


	17. Dear Diary: Structure & Cosmetics

**A/N:** This one goes out to **Blood Red Kiss of Death** **-- **promptly posted to ease her suffering. At some point, you just have to give up your pride and admit..."I'm a review whore." That being said, reviews are always appreciated, be they positive, constructive, or simply 'what the hell is going on?!' They're like the petrol in my fuel tank. That is all. =)

DISCLAIMER: All of the "Dear Diary" chapters are named after songs by The Brunettes.

xoxo

_"This reminds me, Godmother, to ask you a serious question.  
You are as wise as wise can be (having been brought up by the fairies), and you can tell me this:  
Is it better to have had a good thing and lost it, or never to have had it?"  
-- Charles Dickens_

**C****HAPTER SEVENTEEN**  
_Structure & Cosmetics_

Leaving home has made me overly sentimental and scarily poetic. I spent the entire limo ride to the helipad looking at all the buildings passing me by and remembering little moments that happened on the sidewalks, under streetlamps, behind darkened windows. And then there was the fact that it was the last time I would ever ride in that limo and that got me started. I've redone my makeup though, so it's all right.

Now I'm just looking down at the Atlantic Ocean and wondering how I got so far away from all the things I used to want for myself. Where's the pretty house and the handsome husband and the Sunday charity luncheons and the Colony Club membership and the Yale diploma and the two little children – one a boy, one a girl, both dark haired and too charming for their own good? I want all of those things, but...I just can't have them. My little boy is gone forever, I'll never see him again...not even if it's some passing glimpse on a crowded street.

I thought something inside of me would stir when I lost him, some ancient feeling of loss and misery, a phantom kick behind my bellybutton. But it didn't. I'm just so desolately empty in a way that makes me wonder why I ever wanted to throw up my food. I'd give anything to feel full of something again, like those brief minutes when I held his tiny little fingers and watched his little eyes dart around and take everything in. His eyes were brown, not blue, and he had the smallest tuft of dark hair growing right out of the top of his scalp. I miss his little feet and his little **hns wn th ld **–

_Wet spots that were once pearly teardrops mar the page and run the next few words together._

Okay, my makeup is perfect again. I'm almost out of mascara, though. I think Dorota left the new tube in the bathroom along with my Chanel No. 5. I did tell her to hurry up, but I didn't mean for her to leave my last bottle of my favorite perfume on my side of the sink. She says she didn't do it on purpose, but I think it was one of her ploys to get me to go back and run into him and rekindle our romance so I wouldn't leave. It was a cute plan, but as we're halfway to France by now, I think it's well and dead.

I wish I had something to hold, other than this pen, but I left the people I love back in Manhattan and I'll never be the same without them. What was I thinking?

Okay, I know what I was thinking because I thought it out very well, but I didn't know then how lonely this seat would be. I don't know where I am in this world anymore, what I'm supposed to do now that I can never have another little wriggling baby again, or where I belong once I accept that. That's why I'm going to the chateau alone, to figure everything out. It's the smart decision, even he thought so. He. Chuck. I told myself I could never hear or think that name again, but I didn't say I couldn't write it.

Chuck Chuck Chuck Chuck.

I've never hated him and loved him so much in all my life, not even when he got me pregnant and I wanted to castrate him and become the devil in his personal hell. Oh god, that got me smiling. I would give anything to be able to say that again. I miss that version of me. He misses her too. I miss who he used to be. That's why we can't be together anymore. I'm forever in love with the boy leaning against his limo like a scene right out of my every black and white fantasy, forever in love with presents and those three words over and over again between sweet upturned kisses. And he's in love with a girl in red lipstick, on a stage that doesn't exist anymore, wearing a slip she tossed out years ago.

But those people aren't alive anymore. Too many things have happened to them and broken them down into entirely new people who look at each other and don't see anything in each other's eyes that could possibly

See? I'm overly sentimental and scarily poetic and it needs to stop. I'm writing this to say goodbye to all of those things, because I can't be that girl anymore. I can feel the fear tingling in my spine and I'm going to stop writing about it and just stare out the window and pretend the puffy clouds are a cotton candy fairy kingdom. For the last time.

From now on,  
_Blair Waldorf_


	18. Truth, or What You're Supposed to Think?

**A/N:** This chapter didn't really end up where it was supposed to, but that's the fun of writing! I really like the way it turned out. =] Mad thanks to **Dernier Cri** for her crazy-entertaining reviews, which prompted me to chug along on this little gem in the middle of severe tornado weather. Bon appetit!

xoxo

**CHAPTER EIGHTEEN**_  
Truth, or What You're Supposed to Think?_

I had spent hours, maybe even days, imagining what my first meeting with Chuck Bass would be like. My favorite possibility was that it would happen in the same park from my dream, or perhaps he would save me from a crowded street corner and lead me toward the kite-flying children on a green hill. That was an idle fantasy, though, and I knew the more likely scenario involved an office. He would be behind a large desk, in front of a solid wall of windows that granted a spectacular view of Manhattan, and I would walk through the door after informing his secretary that a 'Ms. Waldorf' was here to see him.

He would see me and know what I was there to find out, and he would gesture towards one of the chairs in front of his desk and ask me to sit down. Then he would tell me everything I wanted to know, without hesitation, and then I would know where I was supposed to be, and I would finally have someone to call _papa_.

Meeting Teddy Bass was nothing like I had expected. Not that I had ever _expected_ to meet Teddy Bass.

Teddy _**Bass**_.

My heart skipped a beat or ninety.

There were so many things to say – a billion combinations of questions to ask, just as many facial expressions to watch, and probably twice as many sparks of recognition to glimmer in his milk chocolate eyes.

His lips quirked and my heart changed its mind and raced up into my throat. I knew that smile.

"What?" he asked, seeming vaguely amused and mostly confused. My eyes hadn't left his since he had uttered that one-syllable name I _dreamt_ of. One word, four letters, nothing anyone else would glance at except perhaps to ponder what world-domination must be like. To me, it was longer than _Holy Spirit_, more powerful than_ God_, more precious than _Jesus Christ_.

If I was blasphemous, I didn't know it. That four-letter word had, after all, been my salvation.

I wanted to say_ "Your last name is Bass!" _or_ "You have your dad's eyebrows" _but I had enough of sanity's indistinct close cousin, common sense, left in my brain to suck my bottom lip between my teeth and let the urges pass. Stating the obvious would only earn a baffled confirmation, possibly accompanied by a lopsided look of 'you poor, insane girl'; and comparing Teddy's facial attributes to his father's would get me nothing but mère's bedroom to myself when he hurried out.

So, my brain shuffled through a variety of other, more polite, options and landed on, "Your father is Chuck Bass."

Teddy's eyebrows instantly went lopsided, and I felt like asking him to smack me in the head to spare myself the humiliation.

"Uh, yeah..." He leaned away from me and I wondered if he thought I was going to kidnap him for ransom or something, until he straightened back up with the unlit joint back between his fingers.

I expected him to ask how I knew that, but maybe he assumed Nate or Jenny, or any other one of ma mère and Chuck Bass's mutual friends had mentioned it, because he stood up and wandered toward the vanity beside the woman in the blue dress. As he fiddled with his messy hair, I sat in repose, trying to slow down my heart before I went into cardiac arrest. What else could I say? 'I need to see him as soon as possible'? When he wanted to know why, would 'it's just really important and personal' even fool him for a second?

Being that I didn't know anything about Teddy Bass other than his parentage and the fact that he liked to smoke pot and play video games with Lex, I couldn't predict his reaction. I needed to be smooth, unassuming, nonthreatening, possibly even charming and likable. Maybe I wouldn't even have to trick him into introducing me to his father. _Maybe_ we would become fast friends, he would invite me over to his house to hang out, and Chuck Bass would _be there..._reading the paper with an ankle crossed over the opposite knee, smoking a cigar and certainly not expecting to see _me_.

I liked that scenario even more than the chummy office chat.

So, I stood and joined him in front of the mirror and brushed my bangs neatly away from my eyes. I didn't watch to see if they fell properly into place, though, because I was really looking a little too intently at the reflection beside mine: the complexion that was somehow pale and olive at once, the natural rise of dark eyebrows above deep set and trenchant eyes framed by long brown lashes, the odd quirk in pink lips that was so very familiar somehow.

Of course, he caught me again, and his "What?" was a bit more impatient.

"Nothing," I amended, turning my own dark eyes back to my bangs. But I remembered the gentle curve of his jaw and wondered who it came from. What was her name? And did he know how special she was? The questions tried to bubble forth, but I knew I couldn't overwhelm him too soon, or he would think of me as his very adorable stalker, and then I would never get anywhere near his home _or_ Chuck Bass. "Um, so, what's school like?"

"It's a place where you learn?" He swept his own fringe across the top of his forehead, and then stuck the joint inside one of mère's long-abandoned drawers. A reflection of something in the shadows caught my gaze, but he snapped the drawer shut before I could get a good look.

"Oui," I nodded, torn between coming back with a sarcastic quip of my own and wondering what shiny bauble mère would possibly leave in the States. She loved her jewelry more than she had ever loved me... The sarcastic quip won out, in the end, but I couldn't get rid of the itch behind my ear that told me to open that drawer and inspect to my heart's content.

"I was thinking more along the lines of _useful_ information, though. Anything _useful_ you can tell me?"

Teddy shrugged and put his hands in his pockets. "It's just a school."

The pockets of my lips tugged and pulled the dark red bow down toward my chin. I hadn't thought too much about going to school in America when Nate had agreed to let me live with him, but ever since Aunt Jenny had mentioned going shopping for a few uniform items, I had turned into an embarrassing nervous wreck. The thought of begging for home school had crossed my mind more than twice, not only because I could more successfully avoid the trials and tribulations of the nerve-wracking hierarchy that came with every school, plus it would give me more time to unravel the convoluted mystery that was my family tree. But, something told me Nate and Jenny would never agree to that.

_Maybe_, I reasoned, _since I'm friends with Lux and Lex and sorta-kinda Teddy, I'll have an automatic in?_

I could certainly hope.

After all, according to Gossip Girl's archives, Waldorfs, Basses, and Archibalds had once ruled Constance Billard School for Girls and its neighbor, St. Jude's School for Boys, so why should it be any different just because almost two decades had passed?

It was a good thing I managed to give myself a pep talk, because Teddy remained unforthcoming. The burning irritation rising in the back of my chest reminded me rather violently of the scalding words _je ne sais pas_, pouting red lips, and perfect chestnut curls, and suddenly I didn't want to talk to Teddy Bass anymore. I wanted to wait until I wasn't so shell-shocked by the unbelievable fact that an _honest-to-God_ Bass was standing not three feet away from me.

Of course, I also had an overwhelming desire to aggravate him in return, and I was a slave to that innate fervor.

"Do you think you could be a little more specific, s'il vous plait?"

His lips quirked again. "No, not really."

"Well, _it's just a school_ isn't very helpful." I saw his smirk and raised him one hand on the hip.

He took my bet and crossed his arms over his chest. "Who says I want to help you?"

I narrowed my eyes and the muscles around my mouth tightened. "Well, fine."

"Fine."

"Good."

"Great."

"Stupendous."

"Magnificent."

"Outstanding."

"Spectacular."

"Merveilleux," I put both hands on my hips, and then, before his brain could so much as send a new word to his vocal chords, I bit out, "fantastique, étonner, splendide! Superbe! Merveilleux!"

"You already said that last one," he blurted, before I could continue my tirade.

"I meant it in a different way," I defended, tucking my hair behind my ears and daring him to question me.

Apparently, Bass men were all about dares. "It's the same word."

"With a different meaning!"

"Same word," he insisted, arms still crossed smugly over his white button-up shirt.

"Different meaning!" I maintained, even more irritated than before.

"Same – "

"Different meaning!"

"Same – "

"Wait!" I threw my arms up and let a spell of silence descend over us both. Then, when I was satisfied he wouldn't cut me off mid-sentence, I let my hands fall back to my sides and, simultaneously, we both took a deep breath and exhaled on an eight-count. "What the hell was that?"

"I have no idea." Teddy chuckled and dropped his hands too; they fell into his pockets. "You speak French when you're angry?"

"I speak French when I'm alive," I shrugged, swiping my hands through my hair again to smooth it down.

"Oh, right, I forgot you're from France." There was another long spell of silence, then he grinned broadly and leaned against the wall as he studied me. "What brings you here, anyway?"

_Your dad. Chuck Bass, you may have heard of him. CEO of Bass Industries, really well-known for being pretty shrewd and intuitive when it comes to business deals and mergers and all that mumbo jumbo. Oh, did I mention that I think we might be related to each other, and I kind of need your help to help prove that? I mean, I'm sure you wouldn't mind, you'd be gaining a very high-maintenance sister who couldn't __**possibly **__ever get on your nerves, clearly. So, where should we start?_ _Oh, I know, who's your mother and when can I meet her? I have this diary to show you, it's got all the details pretty well spelled out, and I thought if we could tag-team, maybe Nate and Aunt Jenny and everyone will finally spill and we won't even have to be sneaky about anything!_

I grappled for a convincing lie.

"School."

He didn't believe me. I could tell from the way his grin melted into a smirk and his eyes glimmered. _Oh really_?

"Yes, school," I continued, leaning as casually as I could against the vanity to mimic him. "I heard Constance Billard has a really great drama program, and I need to practice my English if I want to be able to cross-over any time in the future, plus I've always wanted to see New York City, and mère thought it would be a good idea for me to broaden my horizons, plus Nate and Jenny haven't seen me in forever, so they were excited, and it's only really until I...figure out a few things, then I'm sure I'll go...um, _home_."

Teddy blinked. "Wow, you're really forthcoming with the details, aren't you?"

I _knew_ I had been a little too specific. Still, having him believe I was just excessively talkative was better than having him believe I wanted to infiltrate his family with motives unknown, which might have me sent to American jail or something, and who knew what kind of horrors they subjected foreign prisoners to?

"Well, you asked." I shrugged and crossed my arms in much the same way he had before. "I answer questions when asked."

"Ah," he crossed one ankle over the other and nodded perceptively. "Right."

"So...if you could tell me what school is like, it would sort of be really polite. Not to mention, it would ease my mind a little."

A dark line fell across his face, making his features harder and sharper, and he stared at the floor as intently as he had stared at Scarlett Rose over my left shoulder. "You want the truth or what you're supposed to think?"

That sentence was almost like a razor blade to my palms, so hard did it compel me to dig my manicured nails into the grooves of my flesh. _Truth_, he had asked, _or what you're supposed to think?_ It would have been an easy decision, even if I didn't bear the scars from countless rounds with _what you're supposed to think_. _Truth_ was a beautiful, elusive thing to me, and the chance to reach out and grasp it with nothing more than a tenuous nod almost made me cry.

Not that me crying was much of a rarity anymore.

Still, I joined in on his intense stare, and gave him that tenuous nod.

"All right," he said. "But it probably won't ease your mind at all."

He paused, waiting for another nod. I obliged, wondering just how bad 'the truth' could possibly be.

"Most of it you have to see for yourself, I can't even describe it." He broke his staring match with the corner of mère's unused bed, and locked eyes with me. "I don't know what your school was like, but there's a social hierarchy at Constance that's just set in stone, no changing it, no challenging it. It's like in the middle ages, when serfs were doomed to stay serfs forever."

That was certainly not what I was used to – at Janson, I had frequently gone from being queen to lady-in-waiting back to queen down to princess back up to queen, sometimes in the course of one week. That was why the prospect Tristan had given me, of rising above my competition and becoming _the_ undoubted top of the food chain had been so enticing; things at Janson were eat or be eaten, not eat and stay eaten. That would take some...adjusting.

"There's this girl, Saffron, who runs absolutely _everything_."

Without meaning to, I scoffed. Teddy paused and looked inquisitive.

"Nothing," I shook my head.

_It _would_ be an 'S' name, though, wouldn't it?_

"Anyway, I'd compare it to hell on earth, but I say that about a lot of things. Was that good enough?"

"Non. Oui, I mean. Yes." I frowned at my shoes, feeling concurrently better and worse about donning a new uniform and ascending another flight of steps into just another school full of the same people I had known at my old one. The only difference was, I would be just another face in the mass of people who didn't run absolutely _everything_.

I was okay with that, though, somehow. It would be better, really, if I could just fade into the background. It would give me more time and energy to focus on gaining Teddy's friendship, digging the truth out of whatever trenches I could find, and reuniting myself with my real family. And really, all of that sounded much more important than bowing to the will of whatever over-spoiled Park Avenue princess deigned herself self-important and vain enough to be 'queen'.

_Saffron_, I thought derisively. _Bet she's blonde._

"Lux could tell you more about the intricate details," Teddy rolled his eyes and pushed himself away from the dusty little vanity. His fingers caught on the drawer he had hidden his joint in, and I suddenly needed the distraction that unknown glittering object could provide. "We should probably head downstairs before everyone thinks we're getting up to something."

"Mais oui," I agreed, but didn't follow him as he loped towards the closed door. "I'll be down in a minute."

I waited, as I always did when I was about to do something secretive, until I heard the satisfying sound of the door clicking into place in the jamb, then tugged on the golden filigree handle. It slid easily under my throbbing fingers, across the flesh where half-moon markings cut valleys into my palm. Inside, perfectly innocent and unassuming, the joint sat silently atop a pile of...

Photographs?

The drawer snapped open, as far as it would go, and the movement pushed the joint into the solitude of a black, lonely back corner. The pile of neatly stacked photographs jostled too, and spread out, their glossy faces sliding over each other like ice skates on a slick and frozen pond.

First, there was a sunny blonde, her eyes squinting against the winter sun and her ashen locks falling in waves over a stark white coat. Next to her, ma mère in all her youthful glory, a frozen smile etched into her pale features as she leaned her head both towards Serena, and into the likewise down turned head of Nate, whose swept back hair sat thick over his ears. Hidden between Serena and mère, his chin pressed into their shoulders, and his mouth crooked with a satisfied grin that matched the smug lines on his brow, was Chuck Bass.

I picked it up and flipped it over to read _**Non-Judging Breakfast Club, sophomore year**_.

More pictures like it followed. Mère and Serena perched on a set of steps, their stocking-clad knees joined and their arms wrapped around each other in a playful hug; a series of Serena and mère in similar dresses, one red one blue, posing in front of fountains and taxicabs, making silly faces and dazzling the camera with their white smiles; much younger versions of papère, grand-père, grandmamma, and saba at Christmastime; various formal events, featuring mère in an array of beautiful dresses, on the constant tux-clad arm of young Nate Archibald; and then a sonogram.

The baby she had lost.

I touched what I thought was his head, a rounded shape that turned into darkness. "Charlie."

His name left my lips in the barest of whispers. I tucked the sonogram at the bottom of the pile and continued perusing.

Serena in a yellow dress, _**Bart and Lily's wedding**_; Uncle Eric and a man I didn't recognize holding up glasses of orange juice and smiling, _**Eric and Jonathan**_; a photograph of mère and Serena in mint green bridesmaids dresses, beside Chuck and a dark-haired boy with jarring cheekbones, _**Nate and Jenny's wedding**_.

I skipped a large pile of photographs that seemed to be in this same vein, and reached the bottom of the pile.

Mère at 20 years old, her chestnut hair dripping down her back in delicate curls that ended just before the waistline of her pale ivory dress. A black-sleeved arm surrounded her tiny waist, its long olive fingers caught a little in the wispy veil that sprouted from the crown of her head. Their kiss was soft, polite for the polite company that sat politely in nearby pews and clapped politely for the newly married couple.

Chuck Bass lifted ma mère's veil and kissed her in front of a smiling priest.

_**December 27th, 2010.**_

The truth? Or what I was supposed to think?


	19. Manhattan Elleodrama

**A/N:** Here you go! A behemoth to make up for last chapter's slight shortness. I REALLY should have split this sucker into two, but I just didn't like any of the places that I would have to do that, plus all this information is kind of linear and goes _together_, so...here you are. =] I hope the ending quenches your thirst, and yet makes you even thirstier when you're done. Like lemonade!

Also, WOW! 100 REVIEWS! How excited am I? I feel like I should have a cake or champagne or something...or I guess, this chapter can be my celebration of this momentous occasion.

As Elle would say, merci beaucoup.

DISCLAIMER: Once again, everything you recognize from the Gossip Girl world was created by Cecily von Ziegesar for the book series, and tampered with by Josh Schwartz for the TV series on The CW. The new characters are my creation, and I love all of them dearly, even if some of them won't shut up in the early hours of the morning when I'm trying to sleep. There is a certain quote in this chapter that you'll recognize from the TV series, and I give full credit to the brilliant writers. It's one of my favorites, and I just had to use it here!

Also, I've neglected to do this, and it really needs to be said. The characters of Lux and Teddy are really the brainchildren of the 100th reviewer known as **Mibzilla**, my long-time collaborator in such matters. Major props to her!

xoxo

**CHAPTER NINETEEN**_  
Manhattan Elleodrama_

I stared at the girl in the dressmaker's mirror.

She was thin – perhaps too thin, the bone of her jaw protruding at the sides, accentuating her angular, Roman features a bit too sharply. She would have seemed like a model in an overly focused photograph, if not for the sleek waves of chestnut brown hair that fell in perfectly Photoshopped curls around her neatly diagonal shoulders. The light from her bedroom window hit her slight silhouette, clad in a muted ensemble of nutmeg-colored Burberry. The thin merino wool and silk turtleneck drew all focus to her pale, down turned lips; the pleated skirt cinched her natural waist and fell an acceptable few inches above her black satin tight-clad knees. The pewter leather Elizabeth And James caged sandals crisscrossed over the front of her feet, the 4 inch heels giving height to her otherwise petite figure.

"_Last I heard from Serena, Constance has turned into an utter fashion wasteland. You'll find more style on a pack of Chapin girls, with all the regulations Queller has clamped down on."_

I was playing it safe. The girl in the mirror never would have shown her barely made-up face on the steps of Lycée Janson de Sailly, much less her bland ensemble or highly expensive perfectly-crafted-to-match-her-hair-perfectly extensions. Then again, I probably never would show my face at Janson ever again, looking ridiculously fabulous or not.

But I didn't have time to think about that, not with my first day at Constance Billard hurtling at me like a bullet train.

I wanted to fade into the background, avoid the pecking order Teddy had described to me in mère's old bedroom at grandmamma's 5th Avenue penthouse. I wanted to enter their shallow pool without leaving so much as a ripple in my wake. I wanted to be the girl in the nutmeg Burberry ensemble that looked every bit like it had been stolen straight from a mannequin at Neiman Marcus. Which it had. I needed to be that girl, with the shiny new long hair to hide behind, and the uninteresting clothes that no one could envy or copy or ask questions about.

I needed to be that girl, but I wasn't that girl.

Blood or no, I was a Waldorf. I had been raised by _Blair Waldorf_ for sixteen very informative years. And as much as I couldn't understand her, she had shaped me and given me direction, and none of her red-lipped words pointed me towards mediocrity.

So, I changed clothes.

As I slipped into a black Dolce & Gabbana pure silk satin miniskirt, there was a light _rap tap tap _on my bedroom door as someone struck their knuckles against it.

"Come in!" I called, pulling a cashmere-silk pullover over my head.

Lux's blonde mane cascaded through the door before even her mile-long legs could break through the entryway, and I paused stepping into a pair of patent leather T-bar pumps to examine the look on her face. I knew the raised eyebrows meant she was scrutinizing my outfit with her inexperienced eye – being raised by a world-class fashion designer had done nothing for her sense of style, as evidenced by the..._interesting_ aqua multi-colored paisley scarf with tassel detail around her neck.

"Is that Juicy Couture?" I asked, trying to hide my distaste.

Her fingers, adorned with chipped blue nail polish, flew defensively to the little tassels that hung almost down to her navel. "Yes."

I sighed. She had so much to learn, but she was _only_ fourteen. There was still time. I let her faux pas slide and tightened the straps on my shoes.

"What?" I asked when I straightened up and saw her eyes were lingering on my skirt. "What is it?"

Her pursed lips meant she was about to say something she knew I wouldn't like.

"It's just...those little butterflies on your skirt?" She gestured to the white/gray/tonal organza butterfly appliqués on the knife pleats of my skirt. "They're really cute and everything, but Queller..." Her hair fell across her face when she shook her head in earnest. "I mean, are you trying to get detention on your first day?"

The question turned itself over in my brain and I gave it time to sit as I searched the closet for my favorite knee-length Burberry trench coat and a beret that would fit neatly behind my freshly cut bangs. I was in a distinctly Audrey Hepburn mood and felt like nourishing the student body's notions about what the mysterious French exchange student was doing transferring to their school at such an odd time in the semester. The beret would feed the stereotype nicely – I even had a fleeting whimsy to speak with an overly exaggerated French accent and complain about how much better everything was back in 'zee citee of _lumières_'.

What horrible things could I make them think of me? It was every aspiring actress's dream. A clean slate to be whoever I wanted to be...

I set the beret at a jaunty angle and tied the coat's belt at my natural waist.

Was I trying to get detention on my first day?

"Maybe I am."

I grinned at the girl in the dressmaker's mirror and knew that ma mère hadn't been a total waste of time after all.

Lux rolled her eyes, brushing her trashed cuticles through the feather-light folds of her hair, and turned to leave. "Whatever."

"Attente..." I reached for her arm and caught her by her wrist. "Wait."

Beneath my palm, her muscles tensed and I saw her father in the pull of her back. "What?"

I wasn't content with talking to the back of her head – I would have been a horrible soap opera actress – so I turned her towards me and set my hands on her bony little shoulders. "Je suis désolé. Accord?"

Her heart-shaped jaw was briefly as sharp and gaunt as mine. "I don't _speak_ French."

"Amende..." I slid my hands down to hers and twined our fingers together the way we had always done. I smiled at her, hoping for the same sunny smile in return, but all she gave me was a glossy frown. "Okay, do you speak friendship? Because if you do, then you _know_ that I'm sorry for hurting your feelings."

We stood in silence for several seconds, before her fingers twisted between mine and she the delicate frown lines between her wide crystal blue eyes deepened into dark troughs. They persuaded me to frown too, because I knew exactly what the next words out of her sad lips would be, and I knew exactly what facial expression she would make when I couldn't answer them.

"Tell me." She tugged on my hands and swung them between us idly, like two swings pushed by the breeze. "Tell me about what happened with that mean Tristan guy, and tell me why you don't think Aunt Blair is your mom."

The face she made was the same face I made every time mère said _je ne sais pas_, and as soon as I felt my chest tighten, her fingers loosened in my grasp, and then her arms were crossed over her chest and I hated myself for being a _Waldorf_. I wasn't cut out for it, at least it didn't feel like I was ever since those cold looks in Sophie and Tristan's eyes. But I had to be one, at least until I found my real family, because it was the only way I would make it through my search in one piece. It was all I knew how to do, and it was what drove me not to reassure Lux that I would tell her all about it someday, but to shake my head and feel the strange sweep of those foreign curls against my neck as I too said _je ne sais pas_.

"I know what that means," she whispered, staring at me from between the finely spun gold between my eyes and hers. We had been friends for so long that I could remember her staring at me like that from behind pale white bangs in the shadow of my canopy bed, one night when I refused to share my milk and cookies and had to be goaded into it with promises that escalated from a new dress to a brand new puppy (I had named him Maverick, after Tom Cruise's character in Top Gun, because at the time I'd been determined to become a pilot and fly across the ocean to find my long-lost daddy). She had forgiven me eventually for my stubbornness – I was an only child and I didn't like to share, after all, and she and I spent one of our many afternoons playing princesses in the garden. It had all been all right then, and it would be all right again.

"It means you don't trust me."

Even if she hated me for a while.

"You're right." I touched her hair and remained emotionless when she brushed me away. "I don't."

The alarm clock on my antique cream mahogany bedside table read 8:00 AM. It was 2 PM in Paris. I had been in New York for more than a week, and yet I still felt like my school day should be coming to a close; I should be texting Les Misérables in my last class, making top secret plans for that night, inventing a creative outfit in my head and wondering what shoes I would pair with that top.

Instead, I was going to a new school in a new town with exactly one-and-a-half friends. Lex was waiting for us by the tree outside and he and I were getting along fine, and Teddy had warmed up to me a little bit after our meeting in mère's dusty blue bedroom. If I counted my hour-long conversation with my _favorite fashion model of all time_ Scarlett Rose at grandmamma's Thanksgiving dinner the week before, I would be entering Constance Billard with exactly two whole friends.

Lux didn't wait for me to follow when she slung her schoolbag over her shoulder and walked out the way she had entered.

I applied a coat of brighter lipstick, put a few finishing touches on my eyelashes and evened out my blush and foundation, then gave my beret a little pat before swinging my purple Beirn Caroline shoulder bag across my arm and strolling after her. Purple was the color of royalty, and I wore it when I wanted to be taken seriously.

From that moment on, I was in full business mode, and nothing would distract me from my goal.

"Where's the car?" I looked up and down East 74th Street for the Archibald family's shiny black town car, but saw only rows of silent parked cars that I would prefer not to ever be caught dead riding in. A hatchback, really? How did that person ever hold their head up high with any real dignity?!

"Very funny," Lex flicked his cigarette away and adjusted the bag across his shoulder. "Come on, we're running late."

The two blonds turned towards 5th Avenue and sloped along with their long legs like two tall, platinum-in-the-early-morning-sunshine gazelles. I blinked, partially in disbelief but mostly in horror, because their _walking away_ like that meant that there was no car to drive us to school, and that meant I had to _walk_ to school because there was no car to drive us, and that meant that there was no car to drive us to school and I had to walk there!

I had never _walked to school_ before. I pined for my pretty white limo more than ever. I imagined it sitting, abandoned, in our carport, and that image alone made me want to let bygones be bygones and go home to it, and cookies, and chauffeur service!

"Wait, wait, wait." I trundled after them, waving my arms urgently and stopping Lex by his satchel bag strap. "I can't walk to school."

Lex calmly took my hand and patted it, rather patronizingly I might add, and shook his head. Did all Archibalds have to have to have shiny hair that fell over their foreheads into their perfectly transparent eyes? It was annoying, to be frank, and I wanted to tell all of them to just cut their hair or use gel or environmentally friendly hairspray or something, but Lex just grinned that infuriatingly charming grin they all seemed to know by heart, and winked.

Did they all have to _wink_?

"Yes, yes you can."

He tightened his grip on my palm and dragged me along behind him, like a determined farmer heaving a stubborn mule, and I wasn't having any of it. Unfortunately, my god brother was also every bit the athlete slash sailor his father was, which meant his muscles were a lot bigger, a lot stronger, and a lot more capable of dragging unwilling girls across the pavement despite their every effort to dig their expensive heels into the sidewalk cracks.

"I am infuriated," I informed them both, and I didn't have to be walking beside them to see the identical amused grins on their stupid perfectly-crafted faces. "_Very _infuriated, and I demand a car right now. A limo, if possible, but if not, at least something with tinted windows and a driver in a hat!"

Lux grabbed my other hand and aided her older brother. I didn't have any siblings to conspire with, so I was subjected to their teamwork as they managed to successfully tow me around the corner and lead me up the busy sidewalk across from what I knew had to be Central Park. I released a steady string of carefully worded complaints as we weaved our way in and out of oncoming crowds of people walking in the opposite direction, and Lux and Lex did an admirable job of ignoring my every protestation. I had to admit, being utterly _ignored_ was not something I was used to, and it made me even more frustrated than the depressing lack of private chauffeur.

"How do you live like this?" I finally asked, stamping my foot and managing to, briefly, win our little tug-of-war.

Lex chuckled, a sound I hadn't heard him make since my arrival. It reminded me of happy times with him, eating gingerbread at Christmas and hoarding the gumdrops from everyone else and burrowing our ways underneath a large hearth rug to try and hide from Nate and ma mère at bedtime. I smiled, and decided we should all smile a lot more if it would bring back the happy golden past.

...But I was still annoyed!

"We live in New York, Ells." I pouted at him and wondered if he was implying that I was blind and mute. Of course I knew they lived in New York! That didn't answer my question, though, did it?

As it turned out, 'we live in New York' was the perfect answer to my question. We approached the entrance to Constance Billard and St. Jude's, and there were only a peppering of cars parked at the curb – everyone else walked from around the corner, from across the street, from behind us. And then I noticed just how _many_ people crowded both sides of 5th Avenue and realized that practically everyone in the city had to be walking up and down its many intersections to school, to work, to wherever they were going.

Then I had a brilliant idea. Three summers before, I had bicycled my way through Lyon during our annual visit to see papère and grand-père at their chateau in the far-removed countryside, and it had done wonders for my scrawny legs. I would simply convince Nate to buy me a perky little bicycle – at least it would be better than _walking _every morning!

New Yorkers had no _flair_.

My new classmates' uniforms told that story for me. My original nutmeg ensemble would have been just another window display among the unbelievably boring and spectacularly conservative outfits laid out before me – girls in honest-to-god tartan plaid skirts, some of them connected to their shoulders because they were what Americans referred to as 'jumpers', chic but uninspired little ties beneath rounded collars on boring white blouses, cashmere cardigans in every shade of gray and black from the Kansas scenes in The Wizard of Oz, and what had to be 100 versions of the same clunky black shoe.

"It's a wasteland," I breathed, finally realizing what Nate had meant when he'd called Lux's fashion choices 'innovative'. Compared to some of the girls gathering on the front steps, her horrible Juicy Couture scarf was the most colorful thing in the pack – except for my rather bright yellow trench coat, of course. "A _fashion_ wasteland."

Lux released my hand and reached into her bag for a piece of paper. "The headmistress is going to want to see you, and this is your schedule. You have to take it to all of your teachers and have them sign it, and then go to the office and have the secretary sign it at the end of the day." She pushed the paper into my chest and moved toward the stairs with every intention of _actually_ abandoning me on my very first day at my very first American high school.

The only thing I knew about American high school was what I had seen on the nighttime dramas Hollywood shipped to France in badly dubbed packages a year or two after they had debuted across the ocean, and even though I hadn't set foot inside Constance Billard's big double oak doors, it was clear old reruns of _Les frères Scott _and 90210 weren't going to be much help.

I looked to my right to ask Lex for some guidance, only to find he was utterly and completely _gone_. Where had he disappeared to?

_Oh, mon Dieu._

"Lux!" I hissed, trying not to garner the wrong kind of attention as the desperate crazy girl on my first day.

She stopped halfway up the stairs, put a hand on her hip, and turned around. I knew what she wanted and it was _the last thing_ I wanted to talk about before embarking on such unfamiliar territory, but I heaved a long-suffering sigh, put my hands in my trench coat's pockets, and looked to the grim gray sky for some kind of divine inspiration, before letting my apologetic gaze land on her granite mouth and smooth, marble forehead.

"Later, okay? I'll tell you everything later."

The granite and marble only hardened into impenetrable diamond.

"Je promets!" I threw my hands up in defeat, and watched her smile crack the statue and practically spit sunshine at me. "I promise, okay?"

Her shoes clacked against the steps as she bounded back to me and looped her left arm through my right one. "I wouldn't have left you, E Dub."

"Please," I groaned, hoping she didn't expect me to refer to her as _L Ay_ in front of anyone, "don't call me that – "

"Come on, _E Dub_." She hugged my arm and winked. _Again_ with the winking! We carved a path up the front steps, using our combined breadth to part groups of chattering and giggling girls, who stared and whispered behind their hands, and circles of slouching and rumbling boys, who stared and let their eyes slowly run up and down the length of what little my trench coat allowed them to examine. "I'll show you around. It'll give me an excuse to avoid – "

A dark-haired boy, whose face was mostly hidden behind a DSLR Sony camera, crashed with us on his hurried way down the steps. The blinding flash prompted by his trigger-happy pointer finger disoriented Lux so much that her half-completed step lost all its purpose and she practically dragged both me _and_ him down to the ground when her foot caught on his foot, and her free arm wind milled frantically in a desperate attempt to regain balance.

"Sorry!" the boy dropped the camera and let the strap around his neck catch it for him. "Sorry, I didn't see you."

"Cedric!" Lux grabbed the stairway's wide stone railing and knit her eyebrows together so her light blue eyes flashed cobalt. "Rude, much?"

"I didn't see you!" he protested again, his own blue eyes wide with his adamant innocence. "I swear."

Lux continued staring at him until he hunched his shoulders apologetically. "I know, I know...don't take pictures when you're not expecting it. It's just – " He followed us when Lux maneuvered her body around him and forced me to flatten myself against the brickwork to avoid another head-on collision. "It's just when you're not _expecting _it, it gives me more emotion than when you _are_ expecting it and if I don't take you by surprise you just scowl at me which is an emotion, yes, but it's not exactly an emotion anyone is going to want to look at when I finally get my portfolio together..."

"That's Cedric," Lux informed me a bit unnecessarily as he chattered behind us. "He's a photographer." Yet another pearl of wisdom.

"...and even if it was do you want to be remembered as the girl who never smiled in a picture? Because that's the girl from the pioneer days with the bad hairdo and the weird oddly not-there eyebrows and the lack of makeup that makes her look even more unattractive, and I don't think you want to be _that_ girl in _that_ picture."

"What else can you tell me?" I raised my eyebrows both at his diatribe and at Lux's genuinely accidental lack of helpfulness. "That he talks a lot?"

"And anyway, you have a really great photogenic quality about you if you'd just let me do what I do best, and that is observe from an objective artistic distance and capture life in all its forms, including un-candid! Especially un-candid, because life is not candid, Lux. It is a wild and crazy thing that cannot be stopped by your uncooperativeness or your lack of desire to be photographed in your natural state. You can't _pose_ life, Lux. Life cannot be stopped."

"Can your rant be stopped?" I interjected, louder than I had spoken before, the better to force Cedric's mouth closed. "Is that possible?"

"Oh, hey!" His eyes glinted as if he hadn't noticed me before, which I vaguely thought of as a compliment, and he offered his hand towards me entirely unfazed by my bluntness. "I'm Cedric Humphrey, you must be Elle. You don't look very French to me, but I guess I've never been to France, so I'm not a very good judge of what's French-looking and what's not. I guess I thought you'd be taller."

I looked down at his hand and seriously debated _not_ taking it, but something about his enthusiasm for the English language reminded me of myself at six-years-old, pouring over Hooked-on-Phonics and struggling with ma mère's diary; I slid my fingers against his palm and let him shake my arm as violently as he wanted.

"My cousin," Lux finally clarified, and we came to an empty space in the front courtyard. More monochromatic girls and yellow-shirted boys craned their heads around each other for a look at the nouveau French girl (who, despite the beret she had worn for that explicit purpose, apparently didn't look French at all). "He lives in DUMBO, so _he_ has to walk a lot further than you do."

If I were willing to look immature in front of my admirers, I would have poked my tongue out at her. "Salut, Cedric. Elle Waldorf."

"Wait," he grinned a little and swiped his hands through his curly brown hair. "Waldorf?"

"Mais oui," I remembered my glossy extensions and let them tumble down my shoulders in that effortless way I had always envied in ma mère, and put the hand that wasn't trapped under Lux's elbow on my hip. "Why?"

Cedric Humphrey grinned broadly and lifted his camera to cover his face again. "Nothing, it's just..." There was another bright flash, capturing my arched left eyebrow, quirked lower lip, and sharply defined demanding jaw. "My dad says you're everything he hates about the Upper East Side distilled into one ninety-five pound, doe-eyed, _bon mot_-tossing, label-whoring package of girly evil," he snapped another picture when my arched eyebrow leveled out to join its twin in a fiercely narrowed glare that complimented the black tint in my eyes, "and that he would barely be exaggerating if he said Medusa wants her withering glare back."

I wasn't quite sure what to say to that barrage of information – who was this _dad_ of his, and just who did he think he was insulting me before he had ever met me? How dare he call me a label whore! Just because I was well-versed in what designers made high-quality products from high-quality material for high-quality clientele such as myself and just because I took explicit joy in modeling said high-quality products for the world to see did not make me a label _whore_.

A label _slut_ maybe, but not a label_ whore_.

"He means your mom. Your mom is everything Uncle Dan hates about the Upper Eats Side distilled into...well, you get the point."

_Dan Humphrey_.

That name rang a bell from the carefully documented archives of Gossip Girl. The dark-haired Cedric resembled pictures I had seen of his father, from the pointed nose to the wide pink lips, but there was a sparkling white wine brightness in his eyes that reminded me of someone else I knew. Dan Humphrey had dated my godmother Serena for a time, and their relationship had been the center of many scandals over the course of their high school lives. I tilted my head at his wiry frame and upturned chin, but decided it must have been a trick of the monotone light.

"It was in his book," Cedric was saying, his camera once more swinging at his navel, his lips curved into a full smile that held nothing back. He was certainly the most openly cheerful person I had ever met. "Haven't you read it? It was at the top of the _Times_ best seller list for, like, a year or something when it came out."

I shrugged. My interest in American literature extended only to its modern fairytales.

"It's called _Gossip Girl_," Lux said, tossing her stubborn hair out of her eyes for what had to be the hundredth time that morning. "Apparently there used to be this...like, internet stalker?" Cedric nodded at her choice of words. "This internet stalker who followed our parents around and wrote about their lives and stuff."

"Oh, I know, I've been to her website." They raised their eyebrows in surprise; at the fact that I knew who they were talking about or that who they were talking about still had a website, I couldn't be sure, but I responded to their eerily similar looks of confusion with a shrug. "It's called Google, you guys."

A bell rang from within the school walls, and the packs of girls tightened together and shuffled towards the opening front doors. The boys separated and flocked loosely to another set of doors beneath the arching stairway. Though everyone was traveling in different directions, focused mainly on waving to friends or casting flirtatious glances at people they wanted to party with on Saturday night, their stares still managed to linger longer than strictly necessary on my yellow trench coat.

I merely smirked. I could not and would not apologize for a well-made fashion decision.

"Love the coat!" A burst of red floated past, and Scarlett Rose strode to the doors like the runway model she had quite obviously been born to be. Her patterned tights and tattered elbow-link mesh gloves straight from the streets of Milan were the next-best thing to the silk satin butterfly skirt hiding underneath my trench coat.

I beamed at her and returned her buoyant wave. _Scarlett Rose is waving at me. Best morning ever._

Cedric nodded at us both, said something about catching up to us later, and joined a small group of artsy-looking boys slouching along to the entrance to St. Jude's. In front of them, I saw the dim sunlight glinting off the top of Lex's head and recognized the back of Teddy's scruffy hair where it tufted over a patterned silk scarf wrapped around his neck.

I hadn't spoken to him since Thanksgiving, either due to the fact that I couldn't _believe_ he existed or because I needed a while to formulate exactly what questions I was going to ask him the next time we did have a coherent conversation. But I had no more half-hearted or shell-shocked excuses – he very clearly existed, because there he was walking alongside my god brother with his dark hair and my jaw and some version of my eyes and my downward slanted eyebrows when he was irritated, and he was so visibly Chuck Bass's son. He was _so much _Chuck Bass's son that it almost hurt my throat to watch him disappear into St. Jude's.

"Who do we sit with at lunch?" I asked Lux when we finally joined the throng of girls flooding the oak doors.

"Oh, we sit with Saffron on the front steps."

"The front steps?" I blanched. "Of the _school_? You eat lunch at school?"

Lux blinked in confusion and nodded. "Well...yeah, where else would we eat lunch?"

"Okay, where does Teddy eat?" I had no desire to meet Saffron _or_ spend my time out of class on school property.

"Umm, him and Lex usually grab like a hot dog at 82nd Street and eat at the Met, why?"

The shadow of the doorway fell over our heads, and suddenly we were in a wide hallway that branched off into several others, and housed finely-polished wooden-paneled staircases that lead to the upper levels. I saw the lockers through the main arch, and the fact that they were also made of wood and plainly required a dainty little key to turn their locks made me glad that 90210 wouldn't be much help. Everything was so nice and carpeted and well-decorated that I suddenly didn't mind the many-of-the-same clothes or the fact that I didn't know any of the people wearing them.

We took a left and entered the office to retrieve my books, locker number, and key, but Lux and I walked through the motions without really acknowledging the dowdy front secretary at all.

"Ohmygod," Lux never took time to breathe when she was trying to riddle things out, and it tumbled out as one mutant word. "Do you...do you _like_ Teddy or something?"

I barely contained the intrinsic cry of protest that choked itself out of my throat, but I managed to play it off as a strangled cough. The very notion of what she was suggesting made me want to pitch the meager breakfast I'd had that morning into the nearby wastebasket, but I refused to let my body control itself that way. _I _was in charge of what it did and when, and there was no way I was going to be known as 'the girl who threw up on her first day'. Absolutely _no_ way.

"No, non. Non! I do _not_ 'like' Teddy. I just want to ask him some things about – um, his dad's company."

Lux took that excuse with a grain of salt, and tentatively agreed to go with me and meet her brother and Teddy for lunch as soon as morning classes let out. "It's just...you know, Saffron won't be happy if I don't show up and don't give her notice, so – "

"What is she, your boss?" I disliked this Saffron person even more. "Please tell me she's blonde."

" – I just have to tell her that I have other plans and hope she doesn't bite my head off. I'll meet you, I swear!"

And then I was alone in the crowded hallway, besieged by the stares and whispers in a way I hadn't been outside. I found my locker after being jostled a bit, and was glad to discover that it was on the end of a row, next to a beautiful floor-to-ceiling bay window that overlooked an enclosed little courtyard that seemed to lead to the neighboring St. Jude's. _That could come in handy..._

If people had thought my yellow trench coat was too much, the butterfly appliqués on my pleated skirt sent the nearby Constance girls into a tizzy. I merely folded the trench coat and set it on top of the neat stack of books I had arranged on the bottom shelf of my pine-scented locker; if I was giving these poor fashion-starved tartan-wearing sheep something to aspire to, then I considered my trip to New York half a success already.

I was Elle Waldorf, sent from the foreign and fashion-forward land of Paris to breathe life into their stale routine.

That didn't sound half bad.

The whispers followed me through double English Lit class and Senior Physics – I had already taken Physics, but Constance didn't offer any science courses after that. At the front of each neat little square room, I stood with my hands behind my back, my beret tilted jauntily so it fell just-so over my slanted bangs, and corrected the teachers when they called me Eleanor. "Elle," I said automatically, dampening the renewed whispers when the girls realized I was related to the fashion designer. "Anyone who calls me Eleanor will be promptly ignored."

One thing I learned was that American teachers had an annoying preoccupation with _being on time_. I walked in late to my last class before lunch without glancing at the schedule to see what subject I was getting into, and found myself staring at a room dominated by a large red, white, and blue flag that was not decorated with stars or 13 stripes. It was the Tricolore, and the surrounding wall-space was subjugated by post-cards of la Tour Eiffel, paste-ups of differently sized fleurs-de-lis, large maps, and even an awful poster of the tacky glass pyramids in front of le Musée du Louvre.

**Intermediate French** – **Madam Duvall **read the third block on my paper.

They had placed me in _French_?

_Intermediate_ French?!

"Bienvenue, Eleanor Waldorf!" the dotty woman standing so disrespectfully in front of the Tricolore waved. I whipped the beret off my head when I saw the one atop hers. Why did Americans have to ruin _everything_? At least I might finally meet one capable of speaking my language without butchering it entirely – she taught the subject, after all, at least she had to be well-versed.

"Nous sommes si contents pour vous avoir ici du pays de mère!"

I paled.

I literally felt the blood drain completely from my face, because all of it rushed to my outer extremities in an angry adrenaline rush that made me either want to beat her with her stupid beret or tear the Tricolore from the wall and strangle her with it. They could bury her in it, if they wanted to, at least then I wouldn't have to look at all fifty feet of it glaring down at me from the entire _wall_, mocking me with its reminders of how much better things really _were_ back in beautiful Paris-in-early-winter, accusing me of betraying my nation by letting this imposter beat its native tongue with her careless own.

_Merde_.

"Vous introduire, en français," she winked _jokingly_. Oh, she was a joke, all right... "Si vous pouvez."

Her laughter tinkled over the heads of my classmates like a miniature dog's collar bell. I wanted her to choke on one.

"Je m'appelle _Elle_ Waldorf, s'il vous plait." _This is what it's supposed to sound like._

"Très bon!" Madame Duvall clapped, prompting the rest of the class to join in unenthusiastically. "Zat accent!" she gestured towards an empty desk near the front of the classroom and I almost opted to stand in protest of her aurally offensive _Parisien faux_ accent. Who did she thinks he was? I should have her fired for impersonating a Frenchwoman and tarnishing _all_ Frenchwomen's bons noms! "Eet eez almost as bon as mine!"

"Mais oui," I smiled stiffly, my back ramrod straight against my chair back. "We can't all have fake ones."

Only the girls around me heard, and they all sniggered approvingly behind their hands.

The class ended an excruciating hour and twenty minutes later, and I was the first gaunt-faced pupil to escape Madame Duvall's tackily-manicured thumb and gasp a lungful of the fresh, hallway air. I would _definitely_ need to talk to Headmistress Queller about getting out of both my 'advanced' Senior-level Physics course, which was a total waste of my precious time and Nate's hard-earned money, and that abomination of a French class that I suspected _may_ have decreased my proficiency for the actual language.

But that was a quest for another time. Right then, I was focused on rushing down the front flights of steps and waiting for Lux on the curb, on public property, away from any ground that could in any way be the _same_ ground that Madame Duvall was treading upon. Due to what I suspected was Headmistress Queller's increasingly lax acceptance policy, the crush of people on the stairs made it rather difficult to plot my way into the faded sunshine without scratching my pretty purple bag against the corner of some careless freshman's binder or the sharp jagged edge of a set of keys.

When I reached the front courtyard and _thought_ I was home free, a large, broad shoulder rammed into my comparatively delicate one as someone much larger and more muscular than I came through St. Jude's doors. My right hand flew to rub the bruise I knew had already started forming beside my left shoulder blade, and opened my mouth to verbally harass whoever thought they could just go around tackling smaller people like a lumbering _rugby_ player or something, when I caught sight of chiseled Prince Charming cheekbones, and Jeremy Dufour lips puckered around the end of an unlit cigarette.

A hummingbird beat hysterically against my ribcage when, for a brief moment, I thought it was _him_.

Then, his low gravelly voice rumbled, "Sorry," and I saw the careless way his hair fell into disarray around his ears, and I knew it was someone else. _Not him_. I stopped in my tracks and watched him disappear into the thick of the fray, still worried that he would turn around and the hummingbird would break a hole in my stomach because it would _be_ him with his predatory eyes and the upturned snarl of the Cupid's bow on his lips.

A tap on my shoulder sent the hummingbird up into my throat, and only when Lux's skinny arm looped its way back through mine and I saw the gray daylight reflecting off of her pale skin and whitening the perfectly straight teeth between her babbling lips, only then did my heartbeat return to normal.

We stopped in a little delicatessen to purchase vegetarian sandwiches, and took our little bundles across the street to the Grecian temple that she told me was the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Its steps were pearly white beneath the milky clouds, and Teddy and Lex were two little black dots at the very top from where we stood on the cement. The distinguished white columns and spiky Gothic roof were appropriate, I idly decided, clutching my sandwich bag for dear life as we began our ascent.

I had come to pray, after all.

Teddy nodded and Lex grinned at me when the two of us sat down on the step below theirs. "Hey, what's up?"

Lux began a rather listless story about her second period Art class, while I studied the way Teddy leaned back on his elbows and surveyed the slow-moving cabs and buses with the imperial boredom befitting a Roman general; one who might have stood atop a set of steps much like the ones we were perched on and surveyed chariots and neighing horses, whose whinnies were doubtless the ancient equivalent of the loud horn blasts that paid no heed to the signs threatening noise pollution fines.

For the third time since our first official meeting, he caught me staring, but he chuckled instead of scoffing. "What, Elle?"

"Oh, um..." All of my pre-planned words died a horrible dry death in the desert that suddenly dried up my mouth. My tongue became a prickly cactus, and my teeth were sandy rocks that locked together to prevent anything _stupid_ from spilling forth. 'Your father is Chuck Bass' for example. I had suffered enough residual embarrassment from _that_ remark to let my brain catch up to my mouth before I started blathering 'I think he's my father too' and 'Hey, we might be related to each other, want to hang out?'

"How is..." my throat constricted like a coiling boa, trying to keep the sentence from wrangling free, "your...dad?"

"Uh..." Teddy made that face again, the one that made me feel like I needed to be committed to a psychiatric hospital. "Fine?"

"It must be stressful," I had a strong desire to bang my head against a corner of the stairs. Maybe that would make me _shut up_. "Being the CEO of a big international company like that. He probably, uh...leaves you at home with your mom a lot." Lux started choking on her wheat bread, and I patted her back helpfully, like any good friend would do. "Travel and all that."

Lex cleared his throat and craned his neck to examine the enormous banners hanging at the front of the Met. "Hey look!" The voice that burst from his vocal chords was much louder than the easy-on-the-ears melodic tone I was used to, and it shocked my face into _fight or flight?_ mode. "Art of the Korean Renaissance, 1400 to 1600...through December 21st!"

"Now THAT'S interesting!" came Lux's likewise artificially amplified from my left. It reminded me of an amateur actress over-projecting during an intimate scene with her cast mates on a small stage in a packed theatre...I squirmed in my seat, as I probably would have done had I been witnessing a play. Clearly I had said the wrong line, and she was trying to cover for me and get us back into the correct dialogue. "What do YOU think, Teddy? Isn't that _interesting_?"

Teddy let his head loll between his shoulders, then pushed himself into an upright sitting position as he looked back and forth between the two of them. "I think that when they passed out 'finesse', you two misread the agenda and got in line for 'awkward'."

"Did I say something wrong?" I wondered aloud, dissecting my previous sentences for the offending statement. "Am I not supposed to mention your dad traveling a lot, or...?"

"WOW," Lux rubbed the back of her head and stared wide-eyed at the next exhibit advertisement. "We should all go to – "

"Lux, stop it." Teddy put his elbows on his knees and frowned at the sidewalk below us. "I'm hungry. I'll be back."

Lex and Lux both craned around me to make sure he was well on his way to the little hot dog stand that sat where 82nd Street sprung forward from the mouth of the Met, and as soon as he was out of earshot they opened fire on my conversational skills. It was another over projected barrage of louder-than-necessary Archibald berating that went on for several chaotic moments before they caught eyes and realized all they were doing was having a competition to see who could yell my name loud enough the most times.

"Okay," Lex took a deep breath and rubbed my injured shoulder a bit too hard. "The thing is..."

"We don't talk about Teddy's mom," Lux whispered, as if he would hear us from the street.

"Because..." Lex and Lux exchanged another glance and silently agreed to something before he continued. "She's dead."


	20. Any Road Will Get You There

**A/N:** All reviews will make me jump for joy. Don't get me wrong, story alerts and author alerts, and subscriptions are all nifty too, but nothing makes a heart to twitter twitter pitter patter or put a smile on the neutral face like your phone dinging during hellish rehearsal only to reveal **[FF Review Alert]...**amidst a sea of e-mails about mysterious long-lost relatives dying and leaving me their estates and hungry children in countries I suspect don't exist cluttering my inbox...

=] xoxo

"_If you don't know where you are going, any road will get you there."  
-- Lewis Carroll_

**CHAPTER TWENTY**_  
Any Road Will Get You There_

_My head rested on mère's chest, in the space just beneath her collarbone where I could listen to the thump of her heart beating a steady rhythm beneath the shell of my ear, close enough to her chin so I could feel it moving up and down as her mocking red lips parted to form the words and phrases I had memorized a hundred nights before._

"Il était une fois un gentilhomme qui épousa, en secondes noces, une femme, la plus hautaine et la plus fière qu'on eût jamais vue. Elle avait deux filles de son humeur, et qui lui ressemblaient en toutes choses. Le mari avait, de son côté, une jeune fille, mais d'une douceur et d'une bonté sans exemple: elle tenait cela de sa mère, qui était la meilleure personne du monde."

_The world was starting to take shape to me then, or so I thought. Questions were being answered, riddles were being solved, and with every unlocked mystery I was always one step closer to becoming clever enough, pretty enough, and smart enough to figure out what the dark-haired man in mère's photograph had done so well to make her so very happy. I was six-and-a-half, carrying the burden of that diary around in the pit of my chest and hoping no one could see it staring out at them from the backs of my eyes when I asked for help with my English lessons._

_Mère taught me by reading the stories I was most familiar with in the way I was most familiar with them, so I could use my intellect to puzzle together the English fragments into one whole coherent thought._

_I understood a lot more than I had six months before, tucked away in a dark corner and staring longingly at the foreign combinations of familiar letters arranged in strange and incomprehensible ways. I had cried a lot of tears, crinkled a lot of pages out of frustration, and broken a great many of papère's pencils in my exercise books, but I could say 'Good morning' and 'I am fine, thank you. How are you?' and 'What are we having for breakfast today?' and 'Breakfast was very good today'. I had even surprised ma mère one morning by saying 'Can we have breakfast at Tiffany's?'_

_I had also tried to go an entire day calling ma mère, papère, and grand-père 'mom', 'grandpa', and 'grandfather'. But the way the words changed who they were to me scared me too much, so I returned to the comfort of the familiar – they didn't judge me, just simply smiled and continued calling me _bébé, chaton, ma chèrie, mon couer, ma fifille, mignon, ma petite, poupée, trésor_...everything that made me feel safe and where I belonged._

_We alternated between _Le Petit Prince_ and _Cendrillon, ou la petite pantoufle de verre_ so I would think through the words more clearly, rather than just memorizing the sounds mère made and reciting them back robotically. _"The only way to learn a new language is to think in a new language,"_ papère advised me as I struggled to memorize vocabulary words and identify colors according to their English names. _"All of your words and all of 'their' words are the same words, with the same meaning. It's just a different way of saying things."

"_Once there was a man who got married," I murmured, focusing more on the idea of what I was saying than on a word-for-word repeat en Anglais. "To a second wife, and she was..."_

"_Proud," mère coached me, stroking my hair and letting its strands slip between her fingers, "and haughty. She had two daughters of her own from her first husband, who were exactly like her."_

"I can do this," _I told her, sticking out my bottom lip stubbornly and frowning into the warmth of her chest. "She was very proud and more haughty than anybody else, and she had two daughters from...her first husband who were exactly like her. And the man had a daughter from his other wife, um..."_

"_His first wife."_

"Oui!"_ I nodded. "His first wife, and they were just alike and they were the best people in the world."_

"Très bon!"_ Mère peppered kisses across the crown of my head and squeezed her hand into my back. _"Très belle, bébé."

_She seemed so proud that I hated to ruin our moment, our brief shining moment where she was just as happy as she had looked in that old sturdy picture, but there was one thing about Cinderella's story that didn't make any sense to me, and it tugged on the back of my neck too firmly to be ignored. I fully comprehended the fairy godmother and the ball gown and the glass slippers, as well as the handsome prince and the wicked, jealous step-sisters. I did, after all, have a godmother of my own who brought me presents and shone like the sun, and I had seen ma mère in an array of colorful and beautiful ball gowns with elegant shoes to match, and I knew my godfather Nate Archibald was very handsome and princely, and there were plenty of girls in my class who were jealous of my pretty clothes and hair and maman. I even believed in the pumpkin that turned into a carriage, because I had been in a horse-drawn stagecoach once before and it had smelled a little like a pumpkin._

_But what I didn't understand was why Cendrillon's papa and her step-sisters' mère had married each other if they already had first husbands and first wives. What did 'second' husband or 'second' wife mean? Did they do chores that the first husband and first wife didn't want to do? And who decided which husband was the first and which wife was the first, and who was allowed to have seconds? It all sounded very complicated, and I was eager to hear how it all worked out._

_Of course, when I asked ma mère to explain the system to me, she just laughed and hugged me tighter. _"Oh, ma petite trésor, they married the second people because they weren't married to the first people anymore."

_That made no sense either. I had heard wedding vows whispered at ceremonies all over France, and the bride and groom always promised each other that they would stay together 'til death do we part'. It was physically impossible for two people to just stop being married to each other! It went against the whole wedding ceremony, and the wedding ceremony was the most important part of any marriage._

_Mère did not laugh or squeeze me close when I told her this, however. Her hands grew tense in my haywire curls, and the heart beating beneath me was no longer steady and comforting, but rather erratic and worrisome._ "I just do not understand, maman. What happened to the first people if they aren't married anymore?"

"Well, it's like you said, sweetie..." _Her lips grazed my temple, and I felt the muscles pursing them tightly together_. "The first people died."

"_Oh." I felt her heart slow back to normal._ "That makes much more sense."

_We laid together in a companionable silence for an indeterminate amount of time. I just relished the feel of her fingertips massaging my scalp, and I nuzzled my nose into the dip of her collarbone to see if it would make her laugh again. I was forever searching for ways to make her laugh, and if I could not make her laugh, then I wanted her to at least smile at the effort._

"Maman?"

"Oui, bébé?"

"What is death?"

I had known a few people in my life to have died – Nate's mère had visited us one year for Christmas, and the next Christmas she had been diagnosed with cancer and given only a few short months to live. She had seen them out in the Van der Bilt mansion, surrounded by a steady stream of family visitors, but most steadfastly her son who never left her side, not even when she faded away and grew cold. Ma mère had gently pulled him away by the hands, whispering soothing words to him as I sat confused in the hallway. A few of papère and grand-père's friends had passed too, also from various horrible forms of cancer, or from accidents that resulted in trauma too severe to save them from. Their funerals had been sad, muted, stately affairs – flowers, and kind words, and black dresses with black silk ribbons in my hair.

There were plenty of memories inside funeral homes, gazing fearfully at caskets and wondering what happened when they were lowered into the ground. But as many mournful dirges as I had sung behind a pew, as many flowers I had placed atop polished coffin lids, I had never lost anyone close to me. Anne Archibald had let me play with her jewelry box and scolded me rather harshly for accidentally burning her favorite rug, and whenever I saw a picture of her in the townhouse it made me smile, but I hadn't known her the way Nate had.

Teddy hadn't known his mother, either, according to Lex and Lux. She had died giving birth to him, and he knew very little of the woman she had been before that day; all he had were the smatterings his father had let loose over the years, and a picture of her that Lex said he kept with him at all times.

I felt a distinct sadness that muted all the probing questions I had wanted to ask Teddy. The woman whose picture he carried with him, the mother who had nurtured him for nine months and loved and protected him, only to be taken away when both he and his father really needed her...there was every real possibility that that woman in that distant memory belonged in _my _distant memories. If my gut instinct was correct, and it had done very little to make me doubt it in the past – even looking back that close to the events, I could see the little moments I should have cut Tristan loose once and for all – then that same mother was _my_ mother.

What if she had died giving birth to me too?

Teddy and I were the same age, we had strikingly similar facial features, we went to the same places to be alone and think... maybe it was too soon to make such assumptions, but as I watched him hand the hot dog stand owner a bill and take his food in exchange, I could only hope that it wasn't too _late_.

The rest of our lunch hour passed in relative companionable silence, and the four of us returned to the shared front steps of Constance Billard School for Girls and St. Jude's School for Boys just in time for the afternoon class bell to ring. I didn't press for more information from any of them, or even ask harmless little questions like Teddy's birthday, or his favorite food, or his favorite color, because none of that would prove anything. Those things would be helpful little hints to start, but they wouldn't convince anyone that I was...well, a Bass and not a Waldorf.

I sat silently in Government class and dreamed my way through the first half of Trigonometry before the sadness wore off a little and I remembered another thing I had in common with Teddy Bass. As the teacher drew examples on the board and talked us through whatever the book said we needed to learn that day, I reached into my Beirn Caroline bag and removed the now fading and dog-eared diary ma mère had hidden so long ago in the back of papère's private library.

Inside its pages, pressed between the melancholy entry mère had written on her way to France and the entry after that which she had dated almost one and a half years later, was ma mère smiling up at me, young and in the arms of a dark handsome man. The radiance in her eyes and in their smiles had not faded along with the colors that had once made the red headband nestled in her chestnut curls so vibrant, and I wondered, not for the first time in my life, what happened to the first people if they weren't married anymore?

Had mère been the first? Had Charlie torn them apart so thoroughly that they had really stopped loving each other and become each other's 'first' wife and 'first' husband. Had Teddy's deceased mother been the second? Or had she died first and had mère stepped in and tried to take her place and failed?

No longer did I wonder what made the girl in that photograph so happy and how to make it true again. I thought of the smiling man and the sweep of his dark hair and the loving warmth I could see in the crook of his arm where he pulled ma mère into his chest. What had made _him_ happy? And what could still make him happy?

I tucked the photograph back between the diary entries and replaced the leather-bound book's place in my lap with my mobile phone.

TO: LUX ARCHIBALD  
**Need Teddy's number, stp****  
xoxo E**

I pressed send and waited for her to send the ten digits as her reply. When I felt the mobile buzz between my palms, I quickly opened it and pressed view when my phone informed me I had **1 TEXT MESSAGE from LUX ARCHIBALD**.

When it loaded, I saw **wut does stp mean **(_Americans can barely speak their own language, much less write it, _I thought silently, scrolling through her uninformative message) instead of what I had asked for, and wondered if I needed to whack my friend very hard with something very heavy. Before I could offer my services to her in a reply message, however, my phone buzzed briefly to signify another text from her in my inbox: **heres the nums =)**, followed by Teddy's home and mobile numbers.

She was safe.

TO: LUX ARCHIBALD**  
Merci, and it means s'il te plait.  
****Get a dictionary  
xoxo E**

I ignored the half-literate response that read **y cant u just say plz?** and tapped the information into my address book under TEDDY BASS.

TO: TEDDY BASS  
**Salut, it is Elle. Lux gave me****  
your number. I want to say I'm sorry for****  
what happened at lunch  
xoxo E**

**don't worry about it**  
2:47PM Mon, Nov 29  
From: TEDDY BASS

TO: TEDDY BASS  
**Thank you, but I am still sorry…I know what  
****it is like to lose a mother  
xoxo E**

It was stretching the truth quite a bit. After all, I still technically had a mère who had devoted sixteen years of her life to raising me and making sure I was taken care of and provided for, but I knew the emptiness he must have felt all his life – the hole in his heart that was big enough for his real parent to fill, that no amount of pretty stories or valuable life lessons could ever really close up.

Perhaps our common suffering would bring us closer together.

**i don't really like to talk about it**  
2:48PM Mon, Nov 29  
From: TEDDY BASS

TO: TEDDY BASS  
**No, of course not. I just thought  
****I would tell you I am sorry and I do not know  
my mother either****  
xoxo E**

**ok**  
2:48PM Mon, Nov 29  
From: TEDDY BASS

I blew my bangs out of my eyes and let the phone snap shut between my palm and the tips of my fingers. 'Ok' was the universally accepted signal for 'leave me the hell alone or I'll start to get really agitated', which meant Teddy was no nearer to telling me about his family or introducing me to Chuck Bass than he had been three weeks ago, before I had ever met him or even imagined a scenario in which I would ever need to think about his existence.

Two letters were all that stood between me all of the things he could offer me. I had not come all the way across the ocean to a foreign city to live with a fractured family to let _two pathetic_ American words be what stopped me from accomplishing my lifelong goal. I had to find a way to get Teddy Bass to open up to me, and I had to do it in a kind, delicate, friendly way that wouldn't threaten him or make him feel like I only wanted to get close to him in order to extract some kind of reward.

Obviously, there were plenty of rewards for getting close to him, but those weren't _why_ I wanted to get close to him.

..._Ok, _they were exactly why I wanted to get close to him. But I didn't think that was so incredibly wrong.

So, I pushed my luck.

TO: TEDDY BASS  
**Ok. It is just I do not have many friends  
****here and I thought we could hang out?  
xoxo E**

That was it. That was all I could do, until he decided whether or not my suggestion was worth his time. The ball was in his court.

When the bell rang, I gathered my things together and made the final trek-to-my-locker of my first official day as a Constance Billard girl. Between introducing myself to everyone – sometimes in embarrassed/extremely enraged French, but mostly in self-satisfied overconfidence – and finding out that the woman who had given birth to Teddy Bass was no longer walking amongst the living, I was extremely tired, sick of congested hallways and staircases, and wanted nothing more than to take a hot bath and contemplate what I would do if Teddy said he _didn't_ want to hang out with me.

On my way down the stairs to meet Lex and Lux for our walk home, I glanced around and saw Cedric Humphrey snapping photos of a few students who didn't appreciate their candid photos being taken any more than Lux did, a few of the girls from my French class who caught my eye and waved congenially, and Scarlett Rose holding open the back door of a sleek silver Mercedes for a slight little bony girl with thick brown hair and glasses. Leaning against the windows of the long, black limo parked behind the Mercedes was Teddy, arms and legs crossed, his head turned down so that it seemed like he was staring intently at a fractured crack in the pavement.

I saw his dark eyes where they flickered up and down the mass of curls that formed Scarlett Rose's famous hair, and I caught the dark shadows that fell over them when that hair disappeared into the Mercedes along with the rest of her; the engine fired up and she was a southbound silver streak at the other end of 5th Avenue.

I watched him stub out the cigarette he hadn't been smoking, saw his shoulders slump as he let his chauffeur open the door for him, and practically heard his heart bleeding all over the fine Italian leather when the door slammed behind him and his limousine took off in the same direction.

The ball was in his court, but that didn't mean I couldn't suggest a play.

TO: TEDDY BASS  
**Me again. Not trying to be annoying, it just  
****comes naturally. But I think I can help  
you with your Scarlett problem.  
Text me?  
xoxo E**

Several hours later as I sat soaking beneath a mountain of bubbles, listening to soothing music play over hidden Bose speakers, and make-believing to myself that I was a mermaid trapped in the tub because I needed a constant stream of water on my fins to keep me from drying up and keeling over dead, my phone went off from atop the fluffy white towel I had set down beside the clawfoot tub.

_When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie – that's amore  
When the world seems to shine like you've had too much wine – that's amore_

I flicked my mobile open and silenced the melody that rang when I received text messages. **1 TEXT MESSAGE from TEDDY BASS**.

**victrola - 10pm**  
7:02PM Mon, Nov 29  
From: TEDDY BASS

I had read about Chuck Bass's infamous burlesque club in Gossip Girl's archives, and was able to find the address in an old entry about the success of its opening night "under new management". The fact that it was still up and running was a bit of a surprise to me – clubs came and went in and out of fashion as quickly and thoughtlessly as leg warmers or glitter eyeliner or those ugly hippie-looking headbands, and many "hot new" clubs were really just redecorated versions of older, tried-and-true ones.

_Slap a new sign on it, give it a paint job, and call it the next big thing,_ I idly imagined some faceless business executive saying. He sounded like Nathan Lane in my head, but a young Nathan Lane in _Guys and Dolls_, not the Nathan Lane everyone thought of from _The Producers_ and _The Lion King_. ...My inner business executive had a very specific vocal cadence.

But I had other things to concern myself with, least of them being my outfit. What was I supposed to wear to a notoriously wild-while-still-somehow-managing-to-be-upscale-and-classy burlesque club that was also apropos for having a potentially very serious meeting with my probable brother about the possibility of our parents being two and the same? It was a very tiresome conundrum and I didn't dare entertain the notion that I had three hours to get ready.

It was 7:10 and I was supposed to be there at 10, which gave me two hours and fifty minutes before I had to walk through the door. But, factoring in the fact that I was slogging through life without a _limousine_ or even a chauffeur with a regular four-door town car, _and_ the little detail that I wouldn't be able to purchase my bicycle until the next morning (and even if I _could_ dash out and buy one, who wanted to arrive at a _club_ in Manhattan in a party dress on a six-speed with fabulous sparkling details?), I really only had about two hours and ten minutes to get ready if I planned on walking to a cab-friendly area and nabbing one before anyone else could, and that was _if _there wasn't terrible traffic and _if_ I could get a cab.

The thought of taking a nap to recover from my brain's overactivity almost seduced me away from my closet, but I stayed strong.

In the end, I settled for a simple but flattering dark purple jersey dress with silk plisse accents on the shoulders, pulled my new long hair into a low, intentionally sloppy bun and ran my fingers through it a few times to achieve the perfect amount of loosely dangling face-framing strands, then moved all my essentials into a complimentary clutch and sauntered out the door in a trusty pair of Steve Madden pumps.

Three blocks later, they didn't feel so _trusty_. Four blocks later, they were downright traitors. Five blocks later and I was wondering whether or not New York City had lost all of its taxis to a taxi plague or a taxi protest or a mass No More Taxis e-mail.

I tried to dull the throbbing that pained every individual part of my feet in varying and excruciating degrees by imagining the conversation I was about to have. It was _the_ break I had been waiting for, a shining light beaming down from the albeit rather gray-looking heavens and leading me down the path to the _end_ of the years of guessing and dreaming and imagining and theorizing. Teddy would have the facts and Eric would have the details, and...

The thought struck me. What would I do with myself when I didn't have this mystery hanging over my head? Would I finally be able to stop carrying around that old photograph like it was the icon in my own private idol-worshiping religion? Would I be able to let go of my Bible, the journal ma mère had tried to hide away? Had divine intervention interceded all those years to lead me to that very night, walking by myself in uncomfortable heels on unforgiving concrete to meet Chuck Bass's dead wife's son in a burlesque club every cab in the city seemed to be avoiding?

Most importantly, what would I do when I couldn't go crazy with practically endless streams of religious metaphors?

_Merci_, I thought when my sore and aching raised arm finally procured me speedy, smelly, dirty transportation to the unimpressive façade of what I knew had to house a _very_ impressive interior. It couldn't have survived as long as it had with less-than-remarkable atmosphere, after all, and I had a feeling everything Bass Industries invested in had a habit of evolving and adapting to the ever-changing specifications of the high-end clientele the company's name so effortlessly attracted.

As I had always done at club doors, I bypassed the velvet rope altogether and approached the preening girl with the clipboard and earpiece standing near the door within leaping range of a burly doorman.

"Elle Waldorf," I told her confidently, feeling that had I kept my hair down it would have been the perfect chance to toss my curls authoritatively over my shoulders.

"Who?" she looked haughtily disinterested, which I was also used to. To be honest, her attempt at aristocratic boredom was nowhere near as impressive as my mastery of it, but she had probably dealt with more than her fair-share of club-hopping booze hounds who could only troll the streets on Monday nights if they hoped to have a prayer of getting into places like Victrola, so I let her lack of professionalism slide.

"Elle Waldorf," I stressed, making sure to enunciate the _Waldorf_, just in case she didn't realize the significance of that name. When there wasn't even a flicker of interest in her dead blue eyes, I tried another, perhaps more familiar one. "Teddy Bass is expecting me."

"Right." She nodded and I waited for her to nod to the bouncer and step aside to allow me access, but when her polished nails tapped a metrical beat against the underside of her clear clipboard, I realized I was going to be sent to the... "Back of the line."

It was definitely a first. If she had been male or even _looked_ remotely lesbian, I could have had her panting on her knees begging me to do him or her the _honor_ of entering his or her club and gracing it with my discriminating presence.

But...all signs indicated that she had the anatomy every biological female was born with, and the distinct lack of way she cared about the high cut of my dress or the way it showed off my thighs meant she played for the same team I did. Which meant I either had to sweet talk my way in or slip her some cash and hope that would do the trick.

Several minutes and about fifty more rejections later, I got fed up and punched Teddy's name in my address book with as much violence and force as I might have thrown into a right hook, if I knew how to throw a right hook without doing more damage to myself than the intended target, and glared at her drumming nails as I waited for him to answer.

"Hey, this is Teddy, leave a message and make it short if you don't mind. Long messages are enjoyed by no one – in fact, if it's longer than fifteen seconds, I'm just going to hit the erase button halfway through whatever you're saying so – _beeeeeeeep__**.**__"_

_Merde._

I snapped my mobile shut and sighed heavily.

"Let me inside. You have like four people in line," I looked over my shoulder at the losers leaning against the building's brick wall and thanked God I had more dignity than to lower myself to _that_. "Because it's _Monday_ and now that I think of it, you're probably only the girl they get to do this when it doesn't matter who is coming, because it is _Monday_ and an untrained monkey could do your job for you." I paused to let her accept that I knew her ill-kept secret. Then, "_Better_ than you, even without the bad spray tan and bleached upper lip hair."

When she replied, her tone was warmer than I expected.

"You're kind of a bitch." Her too-finely manicured blonde eyebrows arched at me and she lowered her eyes to the clipboard again and checked a box somewhere near the bottom of its page. "Oh, there you are. Elle Waldorf." She shot me an amiable smirk, gave the perpetually pissed off looking bouncer, and waved me past the pathetically drunk idiots complaining about how long they had been standing there waiting.

_Spritz on some perfume and maybe try something in the general direction of not being desperate enough to get drunk by 10 pm on a weeknight, and maybe they'll look past the fried split ends and dry roots and consider letting you in the back door._

I took my perfumed, sober, and freshly coiffed self through the coat check and let the smoky air and scratchy vinyl music seep into my pores as I scanned the booths and chaise lounges for any sign of Teddy's dark, scruffy head. A familiar song sent the blood in my veins humming and I wondered if maybe the Fates were playing one of their often-cited cruel cosmic jokes on me. Did they want me to be too distracted to think about my mission? Were they the equal and opposite reaction to heaven's divine intervention ten years ago?

I silently damned them and their Fately powers and their impeccable sense of absolutely the worst timing of all time.

An arm snaked its way around my waist and the adjoining hand spread its palm over my bellybutton when one of the drunken pathetic idiots who had somehow managed to get past the trained clipboard monkey sidled up next to me. The crook of his elbow fit beneath the downward curve of my rapidly ballooning ribcage like a square block forced into a triangular hole by a red-faced toddler.

_The music from the stage thrummed through our bodies as he turned me around and ground me into the wall, his hips moving against mine with enough electricity to keep even the City of Lights up and running for a year. One of his hands gripped the thickest part of my short hair and he forced his mouth on mine with such bruising force that I felt thankful the wall was holding me up._

"Hey, sexy," he murmured against the crevice behind my ear. "That perfume is driving me crazy."

_I groaned and wrapped a leg around him so he could hoist me onto his hips. This position put my lips even with his, and the kiss became even more violent as I too started gripping at his hair and at the skin underneath his well-fitted but unstructured shirt. I tugged at his neck and let my hips react to his as he slowly and ruthlessly drove me deeper and deeper into the unmoving wall._

"Partir de moi." It wasn't a meek request. I shut my eyes and pretended I was talking to _him _and it seared my eyelids, but it made it easier not to throw up at the feeling of a warm palm on the flat downward dip of my lower stomach. Even through the layers of soft cotton protection and silky delicates just beneath the splay of his fingers I felt the unwelcome heat and the moisture and pinpricks of pain underneath my earlobe.

Sandpaper on my neck told me his mouth had curved into a grin.

_"Non." His answer made his hot breath on my collarbone seem a little less welcome._

"_Quoi? Pourquoi pas?" I was aware that my voice cracked and sounded a bit desperate, and that if I had any dignity left I would climb off of him and demand that he get his act together before he dared to assault me in a dark corridor again. But something kept my sharp heel hooked around him, and that same something made me shudder with want for him as I let his hands guide my hips against the part of him that wanted _me_._

_The groan came from the back of his throat, and the low growl of it made my mind up for me._

"_Elle."_

"_Oui?"_

"Elle."

I realized the voice was coming from somewhere real, somewhere that wasn't an echo from ghosts in deserted corridors deep in the parts of my mind that I wished I could do away with, as mère had tried to do away with hers. My eyes fluttered open and the heat was gone, replaced only with a filmy dust in the places his knuckles bent and his greedy fingertips probed.

"Teddy?" I recognized the voice before my eyes stopped seeing side-by-side twins of flashing lights and swaying bodies through false mist.

"This your boyfriend?" I never realized just how many microscopic hairs covered the entirety of my body until that very moment, when the man's voice in my ear caused all of them to tense and spring up in protest in one simultaneous shiver from the tip of my scalp to the soles of my feet. "That doesn't bother me; boyfriends've never stopped me before."

There was a low self-satisfied chuckle, and then it happened.

The slick, fluid grace with which his tongue claimed my neck drove the sharpest part of my elbow into the nearest available softest part of his body – the tender flesh underneath the pocket of his right eye.

"Bitch!"

His own elbow loosened the grip on my ribcage and led his arm's slithering retreat from around my waist, and he howled with pain as he pressed both palms to the rapidly swelling corners of his raw cheekbone.

"Everyone keeps calling me that..." I whispered, barely registering the much less disgusting feeling of Teddy's hands grasping me gently above and below my own sore funny bone as he drew me away from the sputtering _cochon bâtard_.

"Because it's _true_!" He yowled at me through the cracks between his fingers, and the blind anger behind his words drove me to retreat, shoulders hunched forward and knees sagging beneath the sudden mammoth weight that was me and my hair, behind Teddy. The man snarled and his healing palms tightened into devastating fists. "Oh, little girl, Puny's not going to stop me from teaching you _long, hard_ lesson."

The muscles in Teddy's neck were straining underneath his pale skin, the ever-shifting color of filtered sunbeams streaming through a stained glass window in the low club light, but when he spoke, the tension lent a very aggressive quality to his usually pleasant voice.

"Actually, Puny _is_ going to stop you."

I saw him nod at a man standing in a shadowed corner, and apparently the man saw it too, because he wheeled around and burst into laughter at the sight of a large, muscle-bound hulk of a man wearing a white wife-beater and a furrowed _I know sixty-two very different ways to kill you with just a spoon _expression.

The man let out a loud bark of a laugh, an unpleasant noise that likened him to a wounded stray dog backed into a dead-end with a very disgruntled mother bear. At least, that's how I imagined the scene as Teddy's security detail advanced slowly, veins pulsing in a fine spider-web network across the tops of his hands.

"What, do you think you own this place or something?"

"Actually," Teddy readjusted his grip on my arm and nudged me gently towards the main area of the club. "I _do_ own this place. Or something."

I never did see the sad look of inebriated realization on that creep's face, but the satisfying sound of the front door slamming behind him and muting his rambling rant against me, Teddy, the club, and for some reason, Little Caesar's crazy bread, was all I needed to hear.

Teddy unfurled his fingers from around my arm and led me up to the main stage, where a troupe of girls was doing a very saucy dance routine with glittering feather boas and stationary chairs. I thought, for one rather petrifying moment that sent my old friend the hummingbird bursting through my throat, that he was going to take me up on stage and introduce me as his newest showgirl to a salivating crowd, but that groundless vision evaporated when he grabbed us each a glass of champagne and gestured towards a comfortable looking couch nestled beneath the split-level balcony.

"I'm going to have to talk to Cynthia about the kind of people she lets in here," he frowned as he sat down on the side opposite me, and I noticed little worry lines etched into the narrow gully between his eagerly narrowed brows. "I'm sorry about that."

It didn't matter how fervently I shook my head, the fraught pull of his jaw distorted everything I'd adjusted to in his face's dark, jagged peaks and bends. He was still very much the heir to Chuck Bass's vast fortune, but there was someone else staring at me from the corners of his lips and the quivering tic beside his chin. I much preferred his easy laughs and the flat, even planes of his forehead.

"Really," I stressed, taking a sip of my champagne to somehow prove that he didn't need to apologize to me for the sin another person had committed. "It's fine, I am not letting it bother me and neither should you."

"Are you sure?"

_A needy grasp that exceeded his reach and sped the tempo of my breathing into a hopeless stretch of choked gasps as I tried to find air..._

"Oui! I...I am forgetting it already." He still looked uncertain, but the string tying his lips so tight snapped and he took a long gulp from his flute, draining it almost to the bottom in one fell gulp. "I came here to talk to you about more important things, anyway, so..."

"Right." He swallowed, swiping his palm across his face and letting his body sag into the embrace of the plush couch cushions. Despite the way he rested one leg over the other and didn't seem to particularly care where his arms lay on the velvet scenery, I could tell that we had crossed into business mode. At least that meant he would (hopefully) stop apologizing. "About that..."

"You do not have to confirm or deny anything," I chirped, swirling the clear amber liquid in my glass and watching the bubbles foam and froth at the top. "I am happy to help, though, with the thing that we are not confirming or denying verbally even though I am not _blind_, so it is basically confirmed right now, just without the verbal part from you that really confirms it."

He drained what was left of his champagne and gestured for the bartender to have someone bring us another two glasses. Then, he pushed himself up into a more serious sitting position, swiped his hands through the disarray he called hair, and stared rather blankly at two of the burlesque dancers circling each other in the stage's centermost spotlight. The beat of the song dictated the way the lights changed, and I saw a flickering rainbow pass through his eyes before he took a long, deep, steeling breath and clenched his right fist into a ball tight enough to pull taut the skin that bound his knuckles to his wrists.

"I like Scarlett."

"Bien sûr." I rolled my eyes and took the fresh glass of champagne offered to me. "Tell me some thing I haven't already confirmed nonverbally."

"I'm a Gemini with Virgo rising and Sagittarius moon," he snapped back, guzzling his second glass as if any unconsumed puddles left sitting at its bottom would evaporate into the mist.

That took me off-guard in a very welcome way and I smiled at him a little too politely.

"What?"

I indulged in a celebratory whimsy and clinked the rim of my glass against his. "So am I." At his blank look, I giggled through my mouthful of bubbly and only barely managed to keep it all from rising up the column of my nose. "A Gemini with Virgo rising and Sagittarius moon. June 15th, you?"

Teddy set his champagne down on the table in front of us and blinked a bit. "June 15th."

"2011?"

I held my breath. Onstage, the girls seperated into a staggered formation and took a simultaneous bow.

"2011."

A helpful little hint to start, but it wouldn't convince anyone that I was a Bass.


	21. Dear Diary: When Ice Met Cream

**A/N:** Your reactions make me smile. =]

**CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE**_  
When Ice Met Cream_

Her name change is official today. It's weird, severing her ties so thoroughly with the person who still has every claim to her, in my opinion, legal or otherwise. The fact that he would give her to me at all, much less to come and live with me so far away from him and from everyone she will grow up knowing about has got to be one of the top five most romantic things of all time.

1. That book in the Bible that's all erotic poems and steamy details of why sex is so utterly amazing

2. George Peppard slamming the car door in Audrey Hepburn's face

3. Gregory Peck giving her a carefree day a world away in Rome

4. Rex Harrison wishing her a horrible life should she choose to marry Jeremy Brett

5. Little Ellie sleeping in this little purple bundle of blankets and chewing, not sucking, on her fragile little thumb.

Her hair is so dark, cropping out of her scalp like furry little weed patches and her eyes have already turned deep, deep brown. I'm afraid of when she gets older and sharper and darker and looks too much like him, because then what will I do? I can't cry in front of her, and I can't tell her the truth because it's all so very complicated and she could never forgive me if she ever found out. I think when she starts walking, I'll have to tuck this thing away, and it will really be all for the best. I loathe writing in it anyway, and always have, and if she ever read it cover to cover and thought of the right questions...well, she is her father's daughter, after all, and I'd never be able to turn her down. It's a good thing I'm such an ice queen, isn't it? And everyone always tried to make me feel like it was a bad thing...shows how much they didn't know. I'm feeling a sense of smug satisfaction about that right now that calls for a celebratory drink, but only after I've handed Ellie safely over to Dorota and instructed her to come get me the second she yawns or makes baby noises in her sleep or cuddles with her teddy bear or...breathes slightly differently. I love this little girl so much, I want to watch everything. Her little toes, her chubby little elbows, the wrinkles in her fingers, the angel softness of her pale little stomach. She's just so little. Even more little than –

We should call her ma petite all the time. It can be her nickname. Ellie, ma petite. Petite Ellie. I'll have to tell daddy and Roman so we can begin the nickname ritual today – you have to start early, after all, so it will stick and you can brag years later that you've been calling them that 'since you were born'. Or so I've observed.

But for now, it's time for that drink and I'll hover obsessively over her cradle later and let her curl her fingers around mine so she knows that someone's there that loves her unconditionally. It just breaks my heart that she's not really mine. Not really. No matter how hard I close my eyes and wish.

But today, her name is officially Eleanor Misty Waldorf, and that will make the wishing a little easier.

_Blair_


	22. The Missing Frame

**A/N:** This will probably answer none of your questions...Sorry about that. =) Short and to the point, but hopefully it packs a punch!

"_There is a way of falling into error while on the way to truth."  
-- Victor Hugo_

**CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO**_  
The Missing Frame_

"What are we celebrating?" I asked, looking at the empty champagne glasses littering the table in front of us. I wondered briefly if Teddy had perhaps drunk a bit too much before my arrival, but the steady way his eyes flitted from scantily clad burlesque dancer to scantily clad burlesque dancer betrayed no intoxicated stupor or struggle for focus.

All the same, I switched to a less-carbonated gin martini before the bubbles could go to my head.

"Hm?"

I pointed to the empty flute dangling between his fingers. "Champagne, kind of celebratory. What are we celebrating?"

He lifted the glass to eye-level and peered at the dancers through its handle like he would stare through the lens of a telescope. "I just like champagne."

It was then that I realized that, yes, he was in fact quite inebriated and had been for several uninterrupted hours. The calmness in his gaze was born not from sobriety, but from a very mellow buzz he had no doubt cultivated with the help of some other alcoholic beverage – sherry, if I had to pose a guess. Nothing in his body language gave it away, no droop of the eyelids or slack in the joints; in fact, he hid it very well, talking quite clearly and never once losing control of his motor skills.

The only reason I noticed, and I hated that I noticed it for that specific reason and hoped I could one day forget anything that had to do with that reason and the memories I had made while in the company of said reason, was because as much as Tristan Marchand fulfilled every Frenchman's duty in his devout love of our nation's own wine, his favorite poison was Amontillado, a dry dark amber sherry from southern Spain that turned him from the devil incarnate he was into a perfectly well-behaved upstanding member of society. I remembered all the times I had asked him to have a glass or two of it before even thinking of showing his face in my doorway, and promptly wished I could hire a mad scientist to infiltrate my brain and erase a selective few memories...

Teddy didn't strike me as the type of person to drink _only_ champagne all night, mostly because of the careful way with which he handled his glass's stem, even when the flute was completely empty. He was clearly a wine person, which meant he and I would get along very well, as long as he didn't do like Tristan and switch to _spiritueux à base de plantes d'absinthe_ when his melodious buzz hit its stride.

"I like champagne too," I held out my olive garnish to him and, seemingly without thinking, he took it. I had never liked olives in my martinis.

"We could celebrate my misery, I guess." He heaved a sigh and bit into the olive with a despondent snap if his jaw.

I dipped a finger into my martini and swirled the liquid around in its wake, trying not to smile. "And why are you miserable?" I already knew.

Another heavy sigh and his head rolled slowly from shoulder to shoulder until his dark, hooded eyes met my comparatively bright and vigilant ones. The champagne was taking its swift effect. "I'm in _love_ with her." The emissary from the bar arrived with a glass of Scotch and, without interrupting the flow of our conversation, set it atop a folded napkin in the palm of Teddy's hand, before nodding his head once and leaving in silence. "If red is the color of desire, then I am black with despair."

"Les Misérables," an instant smile blossomed to every corner of my face. "You like Broadway musicals."

"Anyway," Teddy took a slow, appreciative sip and closed his eyes in pain when the lights on stage illuminated the lounge area in a brilliant combination of red and white, that was accompanied by a fresh burst of smoke from the unseen fog machines I knew were hiding just out of sight in the wings. "I love her and I might as well not exist. So I drink and drink and smoke and smoke, but it doesn't make a difference. I still don't exist."

I had never felt as much empathy for a living human being as I did in that exact moment, when the blue veins in his eyelids stood out so powerfully under the heat of the garish lights, when his mouth was weighed down with the burden of his very pathetic heartache and his jaw tensed and relaxed alternately as the thought of his plight became more and more unbearable. I felt his pain in the very tips of my toes, and wondered if it was even scientifically possible that two human beings could connect and tap into each other's emotions so quickly. I had heard the stories of best friends reading each other's thoughts, finishing each other's sentences, communicating silently with just the intentions in their eyes, but the closest I had ever come was whatever warped bond I had shared with Tristan on quiet nights hidden beneath covers or cast in the spotlight of the moon.

It was nothing like the way I knew exactly how ashamed Teddy was of his invisibility.

I wanted to help him.

I also wanted to kick him in the teeth.

"Of course she knows you exist, you go to school right next to each other. She was at _Thanksgiving_."

Teddy groaned and shook his head. "She doesn't _want_ me to exist. I ruined everything."

This prompted me to set down my martini and gaze unblinkingly at him. "What do you mean?"

"I spilled a drink on her dress and she'll never speak to me again." The comedy I might have found in that mournful statement was diminished by the brokenhearted tone in which he said it. He really believed his entire future with her was ruined because of one mistake – an accident he could easily apologize for and _probably_ use as the springboard for an entire flirtatious conversation. He _really _needed my help, and fast.

"_I_ wouldn't speak to me again if _I_ spilled a drink on _my_ dress."

"I don't think anyone else would speak to you either," I said, torn between amusement and sympathy. His misguided lovesickness was very endearing. "Especially not Scarlett."

At the sound of his beloved's name, Teddy downed the rest of his Scotch in one long swallow that brought a phantom pain to the cords along the shaft of my throat. His hair, somehow sensing his rapidly deteriorating state, drooped and tangled around his ears, effectively managing to turn him from the portrait of a sober gentleman into a study in drunken idiocy in less than thirty seconds. If that wasn't bad enough, he had a habit of raking his hands across his scalp, ruining whatever maintenance he might have done in the mirror at home, and efficiently squashing any feelings of compassion he had inspired in my heart. Yes, he was suffering, but his hair did _not_ deserve to be so hideously punished.

"Will you stop it? We aren't nine years old. If you like her, tell her you like her."

"Noooooo," Teddy dug his fingers into his hair and let them stay buried there. "I don't like her."

"Oui, oui, je sais." I waved a hand and yanked his empty glass from where it perched in his temple, above his left ear. "You _love_ her, I heard."

"I do." He tried to take another sip of his Scotch, and didn't realize until I waved the empty glass in front of his face that he had already disposed of it. "I really, really do. And it's hell. On earth."

Before I could expound the details of how wretched he sounded, his eyebrows tapered in two dark, tilted lines, and he was suddenly in full possession of the poise and focus I had witnessed him lavishing upon the most talented dancers Victrola had to offer. The effect of his heavy lids throwing umbrella shadows across the blackness in the centers of his eyes, added to the stony line of his mouth and the twitching tic in his jaw was altogether rather comical, but I let it slide and appreciated the pale imitation of the somberly passionate expression he had intended.

"And you said you could help me."

The real lights dimmed around us, leaving our couch in the shade of the balcony above us, but the lights in both our eyes glimmered brightly enough to see by. His reflected a foolish young man's hope that the brutal pains his heart had endured in pursuit of love were not in vain, and mine twinkled with the girlish happiness of getting exactly what I wanted exactly when I wanted it.

"I did."

The smoke thickened as a new act prepared to take the main stage, but I could see his face as clearly as if we were standing in a meadow on a cloudless afternoon. "Then...do it. Help me. With my 'Scarlett problem', if you think it's a problem you can solve."

"I can solve it," I assured him, crossing my legs the better to flatter the cut of my dress and the elongated shape of my calves where my stiletto heels angled my heels, narrowed my ankles, and lengthened the curve of my thighs. This was something I was good at, and had perfected: looking sexy in a club, holding a martini, and scheming in a smoggy haze just thick enough to mask my deceitfulness from any far-away onlookers. "Et oui, I would call it a huge problem."

"Great." He waved to the bar and had another two flutes of champagne brought over. "To celebrate," he clarified, when I raised my eyebrows.

"Teddy," I sipped some more of my martini and declined the proffered champagne when it appeared at my shoulder. "I'm not doing this for free."

His own champagne flute fell short of his outstretched lips and a dark stain spread over the fine material of his shirt. "What do you want?"

What I wanted was not the thick wad of cash he was probably expecting, because I had more than enough of my own money to keep me in champagne and martinis for however long I chose to order them; I didn't want a business favor, or a pity friend, or even an explanation as to how he had found himself so deeply embroiled in love for the understandably enticing Scarlett Rose – or, Scarlett Kennedy, as she was legally known. Business dealings were of no interest to me, I had plenty of time to turn him into just the kind of pitiless friend I liked to have at my side, and Scarlett Rose was quite possibly the most beautiful girl in the Western Hemisphere. I would have been worried about his masculinity if he _didn't_ find her physically attractive.

What I wanted wasn't even tangible – at least, not what most people would call tangible. To me, it would be as solid and real as the couch beneath us, or the ground under our feet, even if it could only be as wispy and out of my grasp as the smoke that swam in billows over our dark heads.

"Tell me about your mother?"

There was barely any hesitation in the bob of his Adam's apple. "What do you want to know?"

The hummingbird returned, but its wings beat feather soft in the hollow of my chest. Either the champagne and Scotch and possible sherry had affected him much more than I had theorized, or Lex and Lux had painted a far too dismal picture of him and his closely-guarded memories. _He never talks about her_, they had told me, clasping their golden hands together and bowing their golden heads to their knees like portraits of earthbound angels speaking of their Lord and God.

Maybe because they had never thought to actually _ask_.

"The picture," I turned my body so our knees came a breath from touching. "Can I see the picture you carry around?"

I, likewise, had a picture that never left my side. It was safely wrinkled in the interior pocket of my purse. Teddy's was in his wallet, creased and folded so carefully that the lines running from its top to its bottom and from its left to its right were perfectly straight lines, faded milky white only very slightly in the pristine creases. He unfurled it as I did mine, up and to the left, and suddenly I beheld the smooth and perfect face of a smiling woman with dark, dark hair.

She was breathtaking, the very definition of a classic beauty with pin curls and a pale, swan neck that arched from the embrace of two bare shoulders bent asymmetrically around her ears as she posed in a relaxed sitting position in the middle of what appeared to be a very vast, very green park. Her full lips, dark gray because the picture was black-and-white, spread wide over rows of teeth whose slight imperfections made her uneven smile more charming than even the straightest, whitest smiles I had seen in every toothpaste advertisement in the world. The wind caught her curls in an updraft, lifting them just so to reveal pearl earrings in her ears and a tiny beauty mark beneath her left eyebrow. The crinkles around her eyes were not from age, but from the unpracticed way she laughed, because she was so very clearly laughing at something that made her glow and radiate the very youth those false crow's feet tried to rob her of. She couldn't have been more than 25, petite and soft around the edges, with a sharply pretty little chin and a high forehead hidden beneath pin-up style bangs.

The best word to use for her, perhaps I had used it too much, was perfect.

I dared to dream I had seen that same chin in the mirror, maybe even the thin shape of that same nose beneath my eyes, which perhaps were the same shade of brown as hers – the quality of the photograph prevented me from really being able to tell for sure. Clearly I was no match for Teddy's mother where raw and natural beauty was concerned, but perhaps we shared something in the beauty mark or the thin arms or the lopsided smile. Something in her eyes caught me in a spell, and I was unable to look away from the perfection under her elegantly sloping eyebrows.

I stared perhaps a bit too hard, because Teddy folded the picture right, then down, and affectionately ran his thumb across it before locking it back in the safety of his wallet. I didn't mind, though, because the image was baked into the back of my eyes, broadcasting twice as large on the projection screen that was my mind's eye.

"She died in the delivery room," he offered, when I didn't ask any of the questions I had implied I was going to.

"I heard that," I nodded. Offers of condolence stayed safely behind my teeth. "What else do you know?"

Teddy shrugged, patting the wallet into place in his pocket and leaning back into the folds of the couch. "Dad doesn't mention her much."

"Does he say anything?" I knew I was bordering on the desperation I had felt the first time I heard Nate say Chuck Bass's name at that fateful luncheon, a lifetime ago in another world. But I didn't know if I could hide the curiosity in my eyes or the hopeful upturn of my lips, so I allowed my voice to dip in earnest interest, no matter how much it deterred Teddy from answering straightforwardly. At least he was answering.

"Not anymore..." The pleat in his brow returned, and with it came the same discomfiting pull in his jaw. "He used to."

"Why did he stop?" I felt breathless, but the inquiry came out clearer than anything else I had said that night.

_He loved her too much...It hurt too much...He didn't want you to miss her as much as he does..._ As usual, my mind took off before the starter pistol, and I anticipated any number of answers to my question. Why did Chuck Bass keep secrets from his son? I hoped it wasn't the same reason ma mère kept them from me, because if so, I was likely to never find out the truth. And that disheartening thought rekindled my derelict interest in the half-finished martini in my lap.

"I guess I asked the wrong questions," he mused, staring once more at the stage through the filter of his bubbly champagne.

I urged him on, lips pressed against my martini glass in preparation of a long sip. "Like what?"

His shrug was not noncommittal or infuriating, as it had been in the darkly lit remains of ma mère's childhood. "Where she went, why she left..."

"Do you know her name?" I knew it had to be pretty and whimsical, like her.

I was right.

"Misty."


	23. Scarlett Street

**A/N:** Pretty wordy chapter, but I hope you understand why. I tried to break up the dialogue as much as possible, but a lot had to be said.

DISCLAIMER: A snippet from _The Rime of the Ancient Mariner_ is used in this chapter. Again, anything you see that you've seen before - characters, song lyrics, literary quotes, are not my original property and belong to their perspective creators. Previous song lyrics used include "Bang Bang Bang Bang" by Sohodolls, "Our Life is Not a Movie Or Maybe" by Okkervil River, "NYC - Gone, Gone" by Conor Oberst, and "Living in Twilight" by The Weepies. They're meant to enhance their respective chapters, and if I were brilliant enough to have come up with them myself, I wouldn't be here.

=] Thank you.

xoxo

**CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE**  
_Scarlett Street  
_  
"So, walk me through this again."

Teddy rubbed his forehead and stared across the limo at me.

"You think that my mom is your real mom, and your fake mom is just pretending to be your real mom to keep some kind of huge secret from you. You found a diary and this picture," he waved my precious treasure around like a limp handkerchief, "and it lead you on this ten year quest to find "the truth" and _that's _why we're going to Uncle Eric's house at almost midnight on a Monday evening. So I can help you find out whether my dad is your dad and my mom is your _real _mom, and why your "fake" mom is pretending to be your "real" mom to keep some kind of huge secret from you. Is that the basic gist?"

I nodded sharply. I sat quite properly in the seat adjacent to his, my legs crossed at the ankle, hands folded politely over my knees.

"And in exchange for this gargantuan act of sleuthing that might possibly turn entire families of friends against us, you are promising me that – based on an acquaintanceship with her that is tenuous at best – you can suss out my situation with Scarlett and tell me if maybe, possibly, perhaps, if _I'm the luckiest son of a bitch_ in Manhattan, she would ever consider saying 'I'll think about it' if I asked to take her out on just one friendly date that wouldn't even have to end in a kiss if she wasn't ready for that kind of romantic entanglement with me just yet, but maybe in the near future after we've gotten to know each other better and decided whether or not our personalities gel and – "

"Yes, Teddy," I nodded again, and then leaned over to take back my picture before he bent it any more. "I'll see what I can do."

"And you don't want money, or shares in a hotel, or...or for me to invest in some shady business venture, or anything like that?"

I shook my head purposefully, making sure he could see the honesty in my eyes. I really did just want his mystery-solving help.

"Okay." He slicked back his hair, adjusted his tie, and slumped down in his seat to make himself more comfortable. "Tell me about the diary."

"I thought you'd never ask," I sighed with relief when I at last realized he was officially on board my hare-brained scheme. "So, I read the diary about five hundred times over the last ten or so years, and I realized that there are a lot of things that just don't add up. For instance – "

"Do you have a list?" he interrupted, folding his hands over his stomach and gazing imperiously at my empty lap.

"A what?" I blinked back at him, wondering why he was interrupting my grand speech with such a frivolous, unimportant request. I hated lists, had never been able to write one from start to finish without being struck with severe writer's block halfway through. It was much easier to just play things by ear, collecting the information I needed and storing it away in the safe banks of my memory. "No, I don't have a list."

Teddy straightened, tugging on the collar of his jacket a bit indignantly, and held out his hand. "Pen and paper."

"Does it look like I have a pen _or_ paper?" I held up the clutch I had just slipped my picture back into and showed him the tiny interior.

His longsuffering sigh made me roll my eyes. What was the big deal? When I opened my mouth to ask him this, though, he held up a hand to silence me as he fished around in his trouser pockets for something – his cell phone, I realized, when he pulled it out along with a pair of keys and began fiddling with its screen.

"I guess we'll do this the less fun way... continue." His fingers were poised and ready over his mobile's QWERTY keyboard.

"Um..." I fumbled around for what I had been saying.

"For instance," he prompted, already typing something with thumbs that struck the keys quicker than a flash of lightning.

"Oh, for instance."

I cleared my throat and tried to regain my control of the situation. This was, after all, a lot of important information to impart, and if I didn't think he was the key to answering my prayers, I never would have divulged any of it. _He should consider himself lucky_, I thought with more than a little irritation.

"For instance," I continued. "In the first entry, dated 2011, ma mère – Blair." I amended my mistake as smoothly as I could, fully aware that it wasn't healthy to continue referring to Blair Waldorf as my mother, even in the sanctuary of my head. From that moment on she would be only Blair to me, or Waldorf depending on my mood. "Blair mentions how much she hated Chuck Bass, so they couldn't have been married then – "

"Married?" The clicking sound that came from his mobile's keyboard stopped. "My father has only been married once and it wasn't to anyone with a stupid name like _Blair_." He scoffed and steadied himself on the car door's handle when the limousine took a corner a bit too quickly. "No wonder she won't tell you anything about him, your mom sounds like a real liar to me."

"Shut up," I snapped, feeling something in my heart twinge at the sound of someone mocking ma mè–_Blair_. Only I was allowed to do that, and only because I had earned the right after years and years of living under her roof. "You don't know anything about her."

"I know that if she told you she married my father, that makes her a liar."

"Shut _up_," I ground out through my teeth, so offended for her because...she wasn't there to defend herself, that's all. I didn't feel empathy towards her because we had any real connection – she was just the woman who had raised me for sixteen years, that didn't mean I owed her anything. It was just not decent to badmouth her, with her a world away and not able to do anything about it. "Stop calling her a liar."

"Fine," he consented, but the shrug of his shoulders was less than gracious. "But she was never married to my father."

"_Fine_," I said, sick of this line of thought already. "That's not the point. The point is, they couldn't have been married in 2011, but the wedding photo I found in her old bedroom was dated December 27th, 2010, so – "

"Now there's a _wedding photo_? Okay, I've had enough." Teddy shoved his mobile back into his pocket and crossed his arms over his chest. "Clint, we're going to take Miss Waldorf home. Lex's house, now."

"Wait!" I glanced over my shoulder at the dashing chauffeur and shook my head. "I'm only telling you what I saw."

"It's fake," he grumbled. "Or you saw wrong. My dad told me he's only been married _once_, and he loved my mom more than anything."

My forehead softened and I dropped my shoulders so I wouldn't look so aggressive. "I'm sure he did. Look, I'm just telling you how I know Blair Waldorf isn't my mother; I'm not trying to...to imply anything about _your_ mother. I'm sure it's just a big misunderstanding, or there's some kind of explanation. But it's not the _point_. Accord?"

I watched his face change shape about ninety times before he slowly picked up his cell phone. "Never mind, Cliff. Uncle Eric's."

My smile made him shift uncomfortably in his seat, so I moved on quickly. "Anyway, she gave birth to a baby boy who died and she wrote in the diary that the doctors told her she could never have another one. That's when she left Manhattan and went to live with my grandfathers, in France."

Teddy pressed a button on his keyboard, then looked up with his eyebrows crooked. "Your grandfathers live together?"

"Papère and grand-père," I said, thinking of them and missing their warm smiles and loving arms. How they had loved me, pretended I was their very own granddaughter, even though the truth had probably made them withhold all of their affections. They could never love me as a real, flesh-and-blood person, the way they would have loved ma mère's Charlie. At least they had tried. "Papère married grand-père a little while before I was born..."

He looked confused at the thought of someone having two grandfathers married to each other. But I watched the realization dawn in his eyes and withheld a giggle when he mouthed 'oh' at me and motioned for me to continue.

"Then I read that someone 'sent' me to her, and she changed my name from whatever it was before, and...and this is going to sound like I'm making it up," I cautioned him, "but I swear I'm not."

It was one piece of the jigsaw puzzle I at last felt fit somewhere, though the rest of the picture was still indistinct as I guessed my way through the assembly. That picture of his mother, smiling and laughing, her hair blowing in the breeze and her dark eyes half-shut against the sun had touched me to the core of my soul, had renewed something inside my heart I had felt at that first glimpse of Chuck Bass – pure, absolute longing. A hole in my past felt filled, somehow, or at least shoddily patched up with hastily-mixed mortar. And her name, that whimsical, pretty name had vibrated in my head ever since Teddy had said it.

_Misty_.

"Go ahead," he nodded, clearly impatient to complete the unfinished item on his list.

"I don't know what it was before, I guess I'd have to see my birth certificate, but Nate's locked it up somewhere..."

"In his safe?" Teddy asked, frowning at me under the passing city lights.

"I don't know."

I hadn't really thought about that. In fact, I hadn't thought about my birth certificate much at all ever since the plane landed and I tried to adjust to life in a foreign country, but it did seem strange that he would take it and actually locked it away with my passport. To keep me from freaking out and buying a ticket to Bali or something, I had assumed at first, but then I thought about it and the more I thought about it the more it occurred to me...no one had _ever_ let me see my birth certificate. It had always been presented to border officials or airline attendants _for_ me, either by my mother or Dorota, or whatever guardian happened to be at my side at the time.

They were hiding my real name from me.

"What did she rename you?" Teddy prodded, and the tone of his voice suggested he had asked that of me a few times already.

"Eleanor Misty Waldorf."

I expected him to look shocked, surprised, or maybe even amazed. But he simply typed this new information into his almighty list and pursed his lips before glancing back up at me with a candle of suspicion twinkling at me from the slits between his eyelids. "How do I know any of this is the truth? Maybe you just want to prove something that isn't true so you can have access to my dad's fortune."

I scoffed. I couldn't help it.

"Teddy," I looked at the limo's roof and the sky beyond to plead for God's wisdom to fall on Teddy and smack some sense into his brain. Then, I gestured at my Steve Madden heels, the Cartier earrings dangling from my lobes, and the rest of my ensemble, which practically _screamed_ the words 'high end.' "Do I look like I need your money?"

We came to a stop at a five-story tall red brickwork building on the corner of Washington Square North and 5th Avenue. I knew it was late and Uncle Eric and his husband, Colin, were probably either settling down for an evening of relaxation or gearing up for a full night of casework. But the night still felt young, at least I thought so as I stepped into the brisk air and inhaled the perfume that floated across the street from the nearby park. I assumed it was _Washington_ _Square_ Park judging by the name of Eric's street, but I didn't dwell too long on it.

Teddy was close behind me when I skipped between the potted plants and up the narrow set of stairs that lead to the entrance, which was nestled between two Greek-looking columns just like every other white doorway on the street. He leaned across me to ring the doorbell two times, then promptly backed away in one fluid, almost rehearsed movement as soon as a series of loud, deep barks sounded from the other side of the door.

"Wesley, _no_!" I heard Eric command, and the barks grew softer but no less insistent. "Down, boy."

"Beware the dog," Teddy advised cryptically, and the door swung inward to reveal Eric's smiling face.

"Teddy," he nodded affably, obviously used to his nephew turning up on his doorstep at all hours of the night. My presence, however, prompted a more pointedly curious gaze. The German shepherd at his side barked a few times and nudged my knees with the pad of his cold, wet nose, before Eric grabbed his collar and held him back. "Elle."

"You told me to stop by," I reminded him, patting Wesley between his pointed ears. His barks quieted and became pleased panting. "At Thanksgiving dinner when Jenny was lurking around?" He leaned against the doorjamb, ruffling the sleeves of his very professional-looking medium blue Ralph Lauren cashmere sweater. If he knew what I was talking about, it didn't register on the calm, neutral set of his lips or the steady, blank look in his eyes. "For... 'movies with Jules', remember?"

"I do." Eric held his left wrist up to examine the time on his watch and raised an eyebrow. "Where are the cookies?"

_Merde_, I thought. I had been very ardently hoping that his request for a piping hot batch of Dorota's famous cookies had merely been part of the _ruse_ he had suggested to get me out from underneath Jenny's very stern, very annoyingly polished anti-Chuck Bass thumb. When he saw the look on my face – the 'do you really expect me to be thinking about baked goods right now?' look of utter alarm and desperation – he chuckled and gestured for the two of us to pass over his threshold.

"I see Wesley has taken a liking to you," he grinned and shut the front door behind us. "And that you've recruited Teddy to aid you in your investigations. Something about this seems very familiar..."

I looked over at Teddy to see if he had any idea what the knowing little smirk on Eric's face was all about, but my companion merely shrugged.

Sitting in the kitchen, his face glowing from the LCD light of his laptop screen, was Colin, toiling away on some civil rights case or reading up on the latest celebrity news – I couldn't tell because he beamed the moment we entered and started shuffling things away to make room at the table. "Is Elle here to bake us cookies?"

"Mmhmm," Eric confirmed, casually flicking the temperature switch on the oven so it would preheat.

"Excellent, I'm starving." Colin rose to his feet and went over to one of the floating cupboards to gather ingredients.

"Wait," I blinked. Didn't they know why I was here? Hadn't Eric told me he didn't like secrets anymore than I did? Weren't they going to tell me something useful about my past? And why were they getting out a mixing bowl and a wooden spoon and setting them out beside an unopened bag of flour and a measuring cup?! "We have important things to discuss! I can't bake cookies right now."

"You're baking cookies, Ellie?" I felt strong arms around my waist, but managed not to panic because I knew it was just Julian being overly affectionate as always. He dropped a kiss on my cheek and squeezed me close from behind, then picked me up and spun me around so that my legs kicked out into the air and almost knocked a few pictures off the nearby wall. "Thank God, I'm starving."

"That's what I said," Colin tossed an apron at us and before I could protest, Julian was tying it around my waist.

Teddy, rather than helping me, took a seat at the kitchen table and fiddled with his mobile phone.

"I don't have the directions," I tried to protest as Julian carried me to the kitchen counter and set me down only when we had reached the oven, but he was a lot taller than my 5'3" at a comparatively hulking 6'2", and his years as a premiere high school athlete had given him sheer strength I could only ever dream of possessing. So, I was deposited and patted on the head and grinned at as all the men sat in their chairs and leaned back to watch.

Eric held up a paper and tossed it to Colin, who passed it on to me. "Dorota faxed them over this morning."

"I find this very chauvinistic," I grumbled, scanning the paper with my old nanny's unique cookie recipe typed out in very detailed instructions and hoping to God it only took me _one_ warm-up batch to get her very particular formula distilled into a heap of delicious, perfectly crafted baked goods. It would be a miracle.

As I began mixing and stirring and reading and griping, Eric folded his arms over the table and watched me lovingly. "What do you know?"

"That you're all horrible, horrible people." I bit my lip as I tried to very carefully control the bag of flour. "And I hate you."

"Besides that," he laughed. "About Chuck."

"Oh." Teddy's chair legs scraped against the chair as he shifted in his seat, and I paused my stirring to stare at my distorted reflection in their kitchen window. There I was, on the brink of something really solidly important, possibly life-changing, the answers to questions I had felt boiling inside me for the majority of my life, and there I _also_ was, in a _Kiss the Cook_ apron with flour on my nose and sugar in my hair. Anyone else would have sat me down in a comfortable seat, perhaps served me some tea, and retrieved an old photo album to explain things I could never riddle out on my own.

Eric and Colin had me bake them cookies.

They knew me very well. I was instantly gracious for the excuse to do something with my hands without looking fidgety.

_Waldorfs don't fidget._

"Just what I've read in ma mère's diary, and on Gossip Girl."

There was a chorus of laughter from Colin and Eric, and I frowned at them as I stirred. "What?"

"Gossip Girl?" Colin released a breath and covered his mouth to withhold any errant sniggers.

"I haven't thought of that bitch in years." Eric wiped a tear from his eye and waved a hand at me. "Sorry, continue."

"Um..." Honestly, I didn't have much more to say. "I just know that he and mère were – " I hesitated on the word 'married', because Teddy seemed so ready to abandon my crusade at its very mention, so I chose another route. "Involved at some point, that's why I got so interested in him in the first place. I've just always wanted to know who my real father is, and he seemed as viable an option as any, and I got to reading her diary and everything just sort of...adds up and _doesn't _add up. I just want to know the truth."

Eric nodded in understanding and crossed his arms over his chest. "I was in Boston when you were born," he began.

Julian grinned, "Attending Harvard and pretending you weren't interested in dad."

Julian called them both 'dad', and I felt very jealous for a very infantile reason. He had _two_ dads, and I had none. Where was the justice?

"Right, and also very out of the loop with everything going on with my friends. I couldn't begin to explain a lot of things that happened."

My heart sank when I realized he didn't _really_ have any information for me. When he had heard my mission and realized how determined I was to see it through, he had merely wanted to offer an ear. He would listen and wouldn't judge, and might even give me some words of comfort or inspiration, but he wouldn't tell me anything that would lead me closer to the truth. I was adrift on a vast sea of endless knowledge...but what was the phrase?

_Water, water, every where,  
And all the boards did shrink;  
Water, water, every where,  
Nor any drop to drink._

There were people who could reel me in and bring me fresh water, but no one did. They just watched from their cruise ship balconies and let the salt water carry me into oblivion. For all they cared, I would never complete myself – would never fill all the holes that riddled my soul. Because I knew I would never turn into who I was _meant _to be without those questions answered. They sat unsolved, heavy like a dead albatross around my neck.

Eric didn't have anything to tell me. Just an ear to lend and a stove to bake in.

"Serena was here though," he continued, and there was a fluttering of wings against my shoulders. "She can tell you what you want to know."

The albatross took flight.

"Where is she? Can I go see her now?"

Colin shook his head and got up to help me roll the cookie dough into balls. "She's in the Italian Riviera with her latest beau."

"But she's coming back in a couple weeks." Julian spoke from the corner of the room where he leaned against the wall. "For cotillion."

Eric smiled encouragingly at me and it made me feel slightly better. "Mom's in charge of the committee that hosts it."

Teddy caught my eye from his seat at the round kitchen table, when his cheeks suddenly became sunken and his shoulders drooped under the weight of some invisible melancholy. I wondered if perhaps he had been hoping to be Scarlett's escort to the cotillion, and decided that was the _perfect_ way to unite them and fulfill my end of our deal – I would ask Scarlett for a favor and owe her, of course, but the thing about being a Waldorf, even a faux Waldorf, was that I stayed in no one's debt for long. I would repay her however she wanted to be repaid and be free to solve my own mysteries without anyone else's problems dragging me down.

"But only for that night," Colin frowned. "And she's jetting off to London for a club opening right after, isn't she?"

Eric rolled his eyes. "I don't pretend to keep up with my sister's schedule anymore."

"But how will I talk to her?" I felt the albatross preparing to drape itself back over my arms. "I'm not invited."

"Never you worry," Eric winked and stood up to hand me a baking sheet. "I'll handle it. For now, let's make these cookies."

An hour or so later, when Teddy and I made a slow march down the front and out the wrought iron gate to the empty sidewalk, I was feeling a lot of different things. Disappointed that my visit hadn't ended in a startling revelation about my past, excitemed that someone knew and was willing to tell me everything I needed to know, anxious that I wouldn't see that person for 'a couple weeks', worried that maybe she wouldn't want to betray a confidence ma mère clearly held her and the rest of her friends to...

And _cold_. I had neglected to bring a coat along on my excursion in my hurry to make it to Victrola on time, and was paying the price as the two of us crossed the vacant street to the park that lay across it. My thin dress was nowhere near enough protection from the elements, so I shuddered and hugged my arms to my stomach in a last ditch effort to keep myself warm.

We crossed under a large arch that distantly reminded me of l'Arc de Triomphe, and it was nice to find pockets of familiarity in a foreign place. Had I been strolling the Jardins du Trocadéro and been swept by a chill, Tristan would have been at my side with a hat to cover my ears, but never his coat – his coat was long, black, and specifically fitted for him and no one else. He barely allowed anyone to _touch_ it, much less cradle it close to their chest and bend it out of shape. I would have understood, simply berated myself for being so stupid as to overlook my coat, and held the hat around my ears.

I would have been _thankful_.

Teddy shed his coat and offered it wordlessly.

I took it, and was grateful.

"Where's the limo?" I glanced around the upcoming street and wondered why he hadn't just called his chauffeur to pick us up.

"Circling the block for a bit," he told me. "I need to walk."

So, we walked. I didn't ask him what ambling around in subzero arctic weather was supposed to accomplish, or try to convince him that he would be much happier nestled in the leather warmth of his pristinely polished black limo. I just stayed by his side, appreciating the little bit of warmth that radiated through his arm and the vestiges of that same heat that wove through the threads of his coat. The cold probably cleared his head, the way it cleared mine when I sat on my balcony after a long day at school and tried to think about how happy my life would be when I was a famous stage actor, renowned worldwide for my heart and passion and commitment to my portrayals...

Thinking of those balcony daydreams made me wonder what Teddy thought of in the cold.

"What do you want to be when you grow up?" I nudged his arm with my elbow and smiled good-naturedly when he nudged me in return.

"I don't know," he admitted. And I saw a lifetime of expectations piled behind his eyes. "CEO of Bass Industries, I guess."

"Is that what everyone expects you to do?" I wriggled my fingers in his warm coat pockets and was glad for his gentlemanly behavior.

We kept walking, for blocks and blocks, and he never did answer me. Our silence was companionable, to be sure, but vibrating with some underlying conversation just waiting to be had, words dying to be said, feelings dying to be known – I wasn't sure what to make of him, or the different facets of his character I had been shown in such a short time. He seemed kind and compassionate, eager to make people feel comfortable and safe, but he was also stubborn and hard to talk to. Or, maybe he just didn't like listening to obnoxious runts who infiltrated his world and made him bargain a love life for the possibility that his family wasn't what he had always thought it was.

I knew what that was like, so I let him stew in the hush.

Around us, the late night world thrummed along as it always did. People walked and talked and giggled and screamed, doorbells rang and doors slammed shut, faces crumpled and teeth glinted in the streetlamps where mouths parted to reveal them. We continued in a straight line through it all, dark heads bent slightly when the breeze assaulted our eyes, hands burrowed in the warmest available pockets, feet moving at once over the cracks in the pavement.

Left, right, left, right, left, right.

In perfect synch, like the feet of a two-man army marching to an unknown destination.

A peal of laughter sounded from around the corner, and suddenly my feet were moving by themselves.

"What is it?" I turned my head to see what had stopped him so suddenly in his tracks.

I got my answer in the form of a warm body slamming rather forcefully into my own. Before I could even think to gasp in shock or shout with incoherent fright, I saw the hard, cold, concrete ground rushing up at me and knew the world would very shortly be black. Teddy's feet flashed across my peripheral vision, but he wouldn't catch me in time – I was doomed for one very pounding headache when I eventually regained consciousness...

The blackness came.

But there were warm arms around my waist. A large hand pressed against my lower back, and someone's breath was hot on my neck.

_A needy grasp that exceeded his reach and sped the tempo of my breathing into a hopeless stretch of choked gasps as I tried to find air. The world was rushing at me with such speed, that the scenery streaked behind it like neon lights waving against a black night sky, but I saw those stripes extend and brighten in slow motion. Everything fell into a hushed and violent silence, and the world was still and moving and slamming my head back into the wall._

_Stars exploded in the air around me._

I saw stars, but only because they were hanging in the heavens above me. The blackness had been behind my eyelids.

A face swam over me, indistinct enough through the stars that I could almost believe it was _him_. Prince Charming cheekbones cutting sharp ridges above his jaw, Jeremy Dufour lips parted to allow that hot air to permeate my skin without my permission – to warm every fleshy barricade and exposed crevice of my body with his proximity.

Dark hair fell over his forehead in little tresses that teased the top of his brow, and the dark eyes that sat underneath that brow were so sharp they penetrated my dizzy panic with how very dark and blue they were. _Blue, not green_. And the smell that assaulted my nostrils and made the hair on my neck stand on end was not Diesel Fuel For Life, nor any other cologne, not even aftershave. Just the crisp freshness a neutral soap provided, and something more musky than the dark base notes of some false scent, something raw and pure and...

"Are you okay?" a distinctly feminine voice asked.

My vision cleared all at once to allow more colors and shapes to snap into focus, and I was pulled upright so my feet hit the ground unevenly beneath my heels; my torso was briefly pressed flush to a firm and unyielding chest. Then the cold pervaded my skin again, and I found myself staring at the same tall, dark, and '_lumbering rugby player_' boy who had also collided with me in front in the front courtyard that Constance Billard shared with St. Jude's.

Scarlett's long red hair tumbled around her shoulders and the wind tossed its wayward curls over the narrowed concern in her forget-me-not blue eyes. Hers was the voice I had heard, as clear and crystal as her eyes in the muddled confusion of my damaged thoughts. The boy who had both endangered _and _saved me was, blessedly, not Tristan as I had twice feared, but a complete stranger with a head full of messy hair and a Camel cigarette dangling from his lips.

That explained the haze.

"Elle!" Scarlett beamed, and I practically heard the blood from Teddy's bleeding heart dripping on the pavement. Then her smile hardened and she turned to the tall, dark boy beside her and lightly shoved his clearly very large and very toned bicep. I blinked and wondered exactly why I would notice that in the aftermath of almost being knocked unconscious, and decided I was still very much in shock. "Oh my god, Mav, say you're sorry. Forgive him." Her sought-after print ad smile returned in full force as she tossed her head and grinned at me again. "He was raised by a pack of very impolite wolves."

"She ran into me," he rumbled in the low gravelly voice I remembered. "She seems to have a habit of not looking where she's going."

"Oh, like she was the one that knocked you over." Scarlett rolled her eyes and put a hand to his chest. "I apologize for Maverick. He's sorry."

Teddy prodded me in the back and I would have been offended, had his face not looked so completely bloodless. He was all but ready to pass out from the stress of being so near the object of his desire before he was ready to address his so-called sins against her, and I knew I had a duty to get him somewhere safe before he further humiliated himself.

"We were about to go grab some coffee," Scarlett looped her arm through Maverick's, oblivious to Teddy's sharp intake of breath. "Come with."

Before Teddy could stutter whatever foolish phrase I could sense was about to burst from behind the cage of his teeth, wherein it safely belonged, I slid my own arm through his and shook my head in polite decline. "No, no, no. No, no thank you." Scarlett pursed her red lips and I wondered if maybe that had been one too many no's. "Teddy has to get me home before my godfather, how do you say...flips out? I think I'm way past curfew."

To be honest, I hadn't even discussed curfew with Nate _or _Jenny, and had no intention of following one even if they did try to enforce it. I was in New York City on a mission that might require hours and hours of hard work, and some of those hours might be in the safe cloak of night when less people were around to pry and pester. The word 'curfew' was utterly meaningless.

It worked for Scarlett, however, and she simply shrugged in understanding. "Next time, then. Night Elle, Teddy."

She and Maverick continued their route past us, and Teddy followed her with jealous, desperate eyes. I knew what he was thinking, but before I could reassure him that it couldn't _possibly_ be true – they were just two platonic friends out to get some late night coffee because they had insomnia and needed company, and he shouldn't worry anymore because I was there to take care of him and it would all work out just the way he wanted to – he slipped his arm out of her grasp and set it over her shoulders, pulling Scarlett into his body and leaning his head to whisper in her ear.

Her pale arm reached around his waist and secured itself behind his back.

Teddy mashed the buttons on his mobile phone and demanded his chauffeur pick us up at once.

"The deal's off," he informed me as soon as the phone was back in his pocket.

"What?" I stared at him in shock.

Surely he wasn't abandoning me, just when I needed his help the most? Just because I couldn't get any concrete information until my godmother arrived from the Italian Riviera _didn't_ mean I couldn't find out more from Teddy about the Bass family history – his mother, his father, their relationship to each other and when it had begun. It would make me feel productive in the in-between time; it would keep me from lying in my bed late at night and counting down the hours until I could hug Serena and beg her for the dark, deep secrets she kept.

"The deal's off." He seemed to be very adamant about it. "I'm not helping you anymore; you can't uphold your end of the bargain."

"Yes I can!"

I said it before my brain could formulate a better response. I had seen Scarlett's voluntary proximity to that boy, Maverick, and it was obvious they had a very deep connection from the way their eyes locked, and the easy way their hands found just the right place to sit on each other's bodies. If they weren't involved very seriously in a very emotional relationship, then it was at least a purely physical one, and an intense physical one at that. I knew in my head that it was very likely a hopeless case, but I saw the scared little boy I had seen in Victrola, and it made me desperate to ease his worries.

"Je promets," I insisted, unclear exactly as to what I was promising, but resolved to follow through.

"You promise?" I pretended I didn't hear the crack in his voice and nodded zealously.

"I _promise_."

It would just be a _lot_ more difficult than I had anticipated.


	24. An Interlude: The French Connection

"_Saw Cinderella in a party dress, but she was looking for a nightgown"_

**CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR**_  
The French Connection_

Her fingers caressed the smooth wooden lines of her own personal treasure chest.

She had been sitting in the same spot for a little over four hours, perched precariously on the edge of the desolately empty king-sized bed, swathed in silk charmeuse and 1000 thread count Egyptian cotton. Her brown curls drooped like wilted lilies over the bent hills and valleys that spanned from her neck across the flat plane of her back, to the dip of her defeated shoulders.

"I'm a horrible mother," she whispered thickly, some of the notes in her voice off-key and wrong, like the withered hand of a formerly renowned piano player struggling to recapture the music of his youth. Her youth was far from gone however, still a fully bloomed rose in the roundness of her cheeks and the redness of her melted smile.

"You're _not _a horrible mother." Her companion wrapped slender gilded arms around alabaster marble, and let the full, silky swells of honeyed wheat mingle with tangled chocolate. They were a study in opposites, light and dark, tall and petite, even and ragged; a portrait of a determined friendship that, while not entirely steadfast or unwaveringly honest, had weathered worse conditions in situations far more uncertain. The light hit them in all the right ways, mocking the despondent slump of shoulders and crumpled wads of half-used tissue paper with the gentle way it caressed their foreheads and hugged the curves under their eyes and noses.

Blair Waldorf had never felt so fraught, not even on the night she had Dorota pack her things so she wouldn't have to face that master bedroom, or n the day she sat in the bright living room at her daddy's chateau and slowly looped her married name at the bottom of neatly stacked divorce papers for the very last time. Elle had been gone for a while – how many days or weeks, she couldn't be sure: time had lost meaning the minute the front door clicked and the four dogs nipped and rubbed Blair's calves dejectedly.

_When will she be home?_ they begged to know, eyes wide and whines low.

"_Je ne sais pas."_

Elle's bed was comfortable. Perhaps not as comfortable as her own, but it smelled like her little girl, and reminded Blair of those long ago nights, once upon a time, when they had drifted off in the middle of a good fairytale and found themselves tangled in bedclothes early the following morning. Those dark brown eyes had widened up at her then too, though she had not whined, and she had beseeched to know who Chuck Bass was, and what he was to her, and she had begged and pleaded and only wanted to know the truth.

It was a simple wish, and an understandable one. Blair Waldorf hated secrets more than anything, and despised nothing more than learning she was the last to be privy to information that concerned her. It was unsurprising that her daughter would harbor the same antipathy, especially if, as Nate had told her on their late afternoon walk in Dorota's manicured garden, she had been holding onto that loathsome diary for the majority of her life. Unfortunately, it was a simple wish that Blair could not grant – she was no fairy godmother, alight on the floor of a soap bubble or the tail of a shooting star.

She was just a woman with a daughter whom she loved more than life itself; a daughter who hated her unconditionally.

She had said so just before the door clicked behind her.

And the worst part was, Blair didn't blame her. She couldn't. She hated herself too much to fault another for feeling the same.

In the aftermath, she had needed someone who _didn't_ hate her. Someone who didn't hopefully suggest a trip to a duck pond while holding a fresh loaf of bread in her eager hands. Someone who didn't put his strong arm around her, and kiss the top of her head, and tell her that it would all work out in the end. Someone who would be honest with her, but not quite as honest as her own mother, from whom she could only expect a harsh _'I told you so'_. Someone who knew her inside and out, who shared everything with her and was there for her to share things with; who would tell her what she wanted to hear only when the precipice loomed dangerously close, but who would otherwise be frank and honest and opinionated to a fault, as she was in regards to everything else.

Serena van der Woodsen had left a very posh set up with a very doting boyfriend in the middle of the Italian Riviera, taken the first available commercial flight to Paris, and arrived on Blair's doorstep within hours of the tearful phone call begging for her presence. Dorota had shown her to Elle's deserted bedroom, where Blair had been sitting demurely at the window and staring unblinkingly at the shape of the Eiffel Tower in the nearby distance.

How lucky she was to live in one of the most romantic cities on earth. How lucky she was to have money, and status, and beauty, and power, and a good reputation...what was it she had read once, in some book on her daddy's shelf? _She was of the stuff of which great men's mothers are made. She was indispensable to high generation, hated at tea parties, feared in shops, and loved at crises._ If she had been the Queen Bee in Manhattan, France offered only infinitely more opportunities for intrigue, wild romance, and craftily plotted schemes. Her social circle consisted of the usual society matrons, debutante wives, _nouveau riche_ heiresses, and foreign nobility, yet _she_ was the one they feared and obeyed. It was what she had always known, always hated, and always excelled at.

It was very lonely at the top.

Things had been easier in Elle's childhood years, when her eyes had shone with unreserved adoration, when the simple permission of a vanity hairbrush and a stool on which to stand (the better to reach the top of Blair's curls) had sent her squealing with delight. The makeshift Cave of Wonders beneath her covers had always been magical, a place where Blair could lose herself in her own infantile whimsies: the handsome prince, the dashing knight, the beautiful princess with the world at her feet...

But adolescence had brought with it change, as Blair had always known it would. Of course Elle would take her for granted, of course she would prefer the company of her friends, and of course she would always want to be out and about and young and beautiful; and she was, and her mother couldn't be more proud. If it weren't for the way that shine of adoration had darkened into a glint of detestation, she would have handled the transformation with more graceful dignity.

Of course she wanted her daughter to love her. Didn't every mother?

But if that love came at the expense of everything she had built over the course of 16 very long and lonesome years...

It was too much to lose. And she had let Elle leave before she could even tell her she would miss her.

She didn't feel very much like a great mother.

"Then I'm a horrible human being."

"I can't disagree with you there." Serena brushed the hair out of Blair's eyes and smiled kindly. "But I love you anyway."

"You do?"

Her best friend kissed her temple and snuggled deeper into their embrace. "Of course I do. You're my B."

Blair closed her eyes and let herself sink into the familiarity. She could have been eighteen again, in that moment. "And you're my S."

Dorota entered with a tray of tea that would remain untouched in the place of another tray of tea, and collected the mountain of discarded hankies without saying a word, or casting even so much as a disappointed eyebrow in Blair's direction. The red rims around her own eyes suggested that the wastebasket in her bedroom was likewise dominated by Kleenex.

Serena looked between the two of them and refused to accept what things had come to. "What are we going to do?"

"Sulk?" Blair suggested; the expectant upturn of her eyebrows made the blonde laugh. "While watching _Breakfast at Tiffany's_?"

"Blair, no," Serena warned, shaking a finger in front of her best friend's nose to accentuate the warning in her concerned frown.

"Can I at least mope, then?"

Elle's smallest dog, a charity case of a mixed mutt named Maverick, rested his dark head in the crushed silk of Blair's lap as if he, too, was prepared for a good long bout of sulking. The largest, a German shepherd she had adopted from a nearby shelter, laid heavily on his paws at their bare feet, the puffs of air coming in sad bursts from his cold nostrils tickling the otherwise miserably undisturbed carpet fibers.

"You know very well that you can't just sit here like a lump thinking about how awful things are." Serena continued stroking the neglected brown tresses, flattening their dying curl even more with the massaging touch of her fingertips. "When has that gotten us anywhere?"

"I can always dream."

It was something she had forgotten how to do, in years of accepting harsh reality and soldiering forward without so much as a single nostalgic glance back. Of course, some nights were burdened and sleepless, plagued by memories of a different time when the world had been soft and inviting; her emotions had been frayed and wire-hot, but she had been alive and life had been an endless expanse of challenges she had been eager to face and overcome. Dreaming had been her favorite past-time – dreaming of romance, and love, and candlelight, and sweeping gestures. Then, when those things were fulfilled, real dreams of a happy home and a loving family, and none of the darkness and hardship that had beset her teenage years.

If only she could go back in time, she would tell herself not too dream so much. It was a waste of time.

Fairytales came true, yes. There was a once upon a time, and a happily ever after. But what the storybooks forget to mention was the ending's sour epilogue, in which the dreams that made the story so bright and wonderful and memorable, died brutal, twisted, and tragic deaths in the throes of their fulfillment.

She had been fulfilled.

Post-fulfillment was so miserably unfulfilling.

"How did we end up here?" At Serena's scrunched forehead, Blair sighed and pulled away. "We're turning into our parents."

"Bite your tongue!" Serena's face was smooth again, but an incensed fury kindled in the ocean of her eyes.

"Oh come on, S." Blair then did something Dorota, Serena, _and_ the four dogs had been waiting for her to do for almost three days. She rose to her feet in one fluid motion, and began a slow, methodical pace that spanned the length of the room, from the bare vanity to the rumpled bed and back again, with just one minor detour to the closed closet doors. "You're still continent-hopping and trading Greek shipping heirs for Bavarian royalty, and what about that entire _month_ you spent in St. Lucia last summer?"

"It was a very satisfying month of relaxation," the blonde defended, crossing her long legs and tossing her hair like a restless show horse.

"Oh, I'm sure entertaining the Australian rugby team _and_ half of Manchester United was both satisfying and relaxing." Blair folded her arms and came to a stop, so that her silhouette was outlined in charcoal by the sinking filmy Parisian sun. "Face it; you're whole life is a _string_ of very satisfying months of relaxation. You're your mother twenty years ago."

That was the end to their tranquil civility; Serena stamped both feet into the carpet with so much force that poor Maverick went leaping behind his larger counterpart for shelter from the oncoming storm. "It's not like I have anyone _waiting for me_," Blair sucked in a razor-sharp breath and dug her unpolished fingernails into the bases of her palms. "And it's not like I go and marry every guy who tells me I'm beautiful and he can't live without me."

"No, you're right," Blair acquiesced. But her eyebrows lowered and her full lips puckered with distaste. "You don't go and marry _anyone_ who shows a romantic interest in you. Or, say, writes an entire book about how much he loves you for the _whole world to read_." It was Serena's turn to ball her long, golden brown fingers into perfectly tanned fists. "Because you're too _afraid_ that one of them might be telling the truth!"

The air crackled before the next words were spoken.

"Better perpetually single and _happily_ alone in my late 30s, than pregnant, married, and divorced by 21."

Then, a pause, as the unspoken line of things-that-shall-never-be-discussed-not-even-in-the-heat-of-anger redrew itself.

Blair sat in the window seat and adjusted the pleats of her wrinkled skirt. Serena returned to her dent in the unkempt bedcovers, where the wooden box Blair had been cradling so maternally for four hours laid forsaken and slightly tilted on its stubby legs. The sigh that escaped her throat sent wisps of yellow hair flying out of her face, and she turned to the dark shadow at the window with cleared vision.

"You know what you need to do." It was as straightforward and basic as that; what needed to be done was no mystery waiting to be uncovered and dissected, but rather an unmitigated truth. That was probably what burned her best friend the most, the sheer blatancy of her motherly duty, and the wisdom that drew her eyes to the mistakes of her past, that could have so easily been corrected by a touch of the hand, a meaningful glance across a crowded room, or a phone call. Just one phone call.

"I know," she affirmed.

"You have to tell her who her mother is, and you have to be there for her no matter what happens."

"I know," Blair repeated lifelessly, her eyes unfocused. "I know."

"I have to be in New York soon," Serena reminded her. "The cotillion..." She watched Blair's fingers clasp a phantom necklace on her naked throat. "What do you want me to do?"

Blair had sat in the same hollowed-out spot for a little over four hours, perched precariously on the edge of the desolately empty king-sized bed, swathed in silk charmeuse and 1000 thread count Egyptian cotton that smelled so hauntingly of her daughter's perfume.

And in that time, she had traced the smooth wooden lines of her own personal treasure chest and known where it needed to go.

As much as it hurt, and as long as she had avoided it, it was time to rip off the bandages of the past and expose them to the harsh, brutal reality of the present...and show them the cold, dismal certainty of the future. A life without those who where designed, conditioned, made, _born_ to love her. A life alone in her tower, with frequent visits from her ladies-in-waiting, occasional calls from her mother the original ice queen, and friendless nights in her bed with only the shadows for company.

It was not the future she wanted for Ellie.

"I want you to give me Chuck's phone number."


	25. The Devil Wears Last Season Prada

**A/N:** Ah, it felt nice to write something light and slightly comedic for these characters! All the mystery and angst was starting to get to me...time to inject some of that Gossip Girl flair. Obvious and numerous _Top_ _Gun _references and quotes used throughout.

All of your feedback is LOVED and APPRECIATED like you wouldn't believe! Thank you and enjoy.

xoxo

**CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE  
**_The Devil Wears Last Season Prada_

_

* * *

_

**CLASSIFIED INFORMATION!**

**Operation****:**  
Top Gun

**Callsigns****:**  
Me (Maverick)  
Teddy (Goose)  
Lux (Hollywood)  
Maverick (Jester)  
Scarlett (Viper)

**Grounds for Mission****:**  
Debt owed to one THEODORE BASS, heretofore referred to as "Goose" for unnamed favors he has paid/will pay ME, heretofore referred to as "Maverick". SCARLETT KENNEDY, heretofore referred to as "Viper" and MAVERICK NOT-SURE-WHAT-HIS-LAST-NAME-IS-BUT-I-WILL-OF-COURSE-FIND-OUT, heretofore referred to as "Jester" have complicated former plans to repay this debt; situation must be rectified BC (before cotillion).

**Objective****:**  
Observe and examine subjects Jester and Viper and ascertain the severity of their association. If a 'relationship' of a romantic nature is discovered, terminate at first available opportunity without breaking the rules of engagement*****. If such a relationship is determined, ensnare subject Jester with girlish charm, snappy wit, and physical attractiveness (low-cut tops and tight, short skirts are recommended, but never at the same time! It's called The Feminine Mystique for a reason. Though many women have forgotten this, I have not) while convincing subject Viper of Goose's many excellent qualities. If association is found to be platonic, still must convince subject Viper of Goose's many excellent qualities, though the lack of romantic entanglement with subject Jester will make this assignment, conceivably, less problematic.

***_When, where, and how force shall be used_**

**_A. You have the right to use force to defend yourself against attacks or threats of attack; _**_after all, a famous 5'8" fashion model used to fighting off hordes of starving runway darlings for the last crew donut after an exhausting show or editorial shoot is more than capable of dragging me into the street by my hair and scarring me permanently with her fabulous nails!_

**_B. Hostile fire may be returned effectively and promptly to stop a hostile act._**_ I'm not going to say that will use her own chic handbag against her, but if it's heavy enough and will provide enough force to knock her over...it is definitely an option, along with my own – which shall always be fully stocked with books in case of this eventuality!_

**_C. When attacked by unarmed hostile elements, mobs and/or fashion models, you should use the minimum force necessary under the circumstances and proportional to the threat. _**_Her hair is insured by Lloyd's of London for $5.5 million. I would rather spend $5.5 million on my own hair, thank you very much. Therefore, no hair pulling! Just violent jerking and lots of slapping and possibly tripping._

**_D. You may not seize the property of others to accomplish your mission; _**_so, no stealing her phone to send dirty text messages to other people and get her in trouble with her (alleged) beau! That trick can only work once in a lifetime, after all, and this is not that time... that time has passed, let it go._

**_E. Detention of civilians is authorized for security reasons or in self-defense, _**_but make sure she's locked somewhere comfortable, like a penthouse suite in some hotel room that only I have the key to. That way when I let her out, she will be relaxed and pampered, probably by the masseuse I'll hire to seduce her...and therefore her interest in Jester will be nil._

**REMEMBER:  
1. The United States is not at war **_(yeah! Wait, what?)_**  
2. Treat all persons with dignity and respect **_(Again, no hair pulling!)_**  
3. Use minimum force to carry out mission **_(Didn't I already read that?)_**  
4. Always be prepared to act in self-defense **_(Nails will be kept manicured and sharp at all times)_

**Deadline****:**  
The week of cotillion

**Attire****:  
**Civilian clothes for face-to-face interactions  
Head scarf of a nondescript pattern, black trenchcoat, black leather gloves, and big sunglasses for incognito operations

RULES:  
1. The first rule of **Operation: Top Gun** – do not talk about **Operation: Top Gun**.  
2. You don't have time to think up there. If you think, you're dead.  
3. Do not fire until fired upon.  
4. And if you screw up just this much, you'll be flying a cargo plane full of rubber dog shit out of Hong Kong!  
5. Top Gun rules of engagement are written for your safety and for that of your team. They are not flexible, nor am I. Either obey them or you are history. Is that clear?  
6. Come on, Mav, do some of that pilot shit!  
7. The seventh rule of **Operation: Top Gun** – do NOT talk about **Operation: Top Gun**.

I feel the need – the need for _speed_!

* * *

"I think you watched the wrong Tom Cruise movie." Teddy snatched the paper out of my hands and read it before I could protest. "And you started mixing metaphors near the end, there."

"Give that back," I snapped, trying and failing to snatch my game plan out of his grasp.

"Why is your codename Maverick, and Maverick's Jester?" He kept me at bay by holding it above my reach. "Won't that get confusing?"

"It is a _callsign_," I corrected impatiently, locking my bicycle into place on the empty bike rack. "And no, not if you pay attention."

"Why am I _Goose_?" Teddy demanded, finally dropping his arms and allowing me to reclaim my classified document.

I folded it carefully and locked it safely in the front pocket of my Prada bag. "Because you are my wingman. Obviously."

He seemed to take offense at this, but I silenced him with one look. **Operation: Top Gun** was _my_ mission, after all; my name was first on the list of callsigns, and I had spent that morning typing up the itinerary on my computer in the kitchen as I watched Nate and Aunt Jenny do an intricate dance I liked to call 'never being in the kitchen at the same time but somehow always managing to maintain a full mug of coffee'. Plus, I was the key to its success, since Teddy was utterly hopeless around Scar—Viper...and since, of the five involved in its fulfillment, only two were actually aware of said involvement.

Lux—Hollywood would be more of a _silent_ helper. Ignorant to her importance, but no less imperative to the mission's success!

We were at the school's back entrance, a quietly modest and less crowded way to enter the buildings, given there wasn't an assembly being held in the auditorium that day. The unadorned back doors were much nearer to the joint lecture hall than the ornate front ones, separating Teddy and I from the majority of the school, which had gathered as usual on the front steps. The wrought iron gates that sprung from the tall, brick walls, made me feel protected from listening ears as Teddy and I stood beneath the shade of an old, distinguished school tree, and expanded on the finer points of my brilliant plan.

"I just don't feel right about breaking them up..." Teddy ruffled his hair, undoing his work in front of the mirror.

"You are _not _devious enough to be my wingman," I sighed. "Unfortunately, I don't have any other choice. Look, do you like Viper or not?"

"Like her!" He bristled and I rubbed my forehead at my poor choice of words. "I _love_ her. I'd do anything for her. I'd – "

"Walk over a pile of burning coals barefoot and invent a bicycle to fly you both to the moon, blah blah blah." I waved his lovesick proclamation off with a disinterested hand. "Teddy, listen to me. Carefully. Oui?" He nodded, and I straightened his off-kilter tie as I continued. "Do not think of it as _breaking them up_; think of it as grabbing life with your bare hands and shaking it hard by its shoulders and looking it square in the eye, and saying, 'Life! I am through being pushed around by you, and I am taking what I want from you and I am _not _giving it back!'"

Teddy coughed for air and grabbed my wrists so I would stop shaking him by his shoulders. "Okay."

"Besides, they might not even be together!" I smiled cheerfully and dusted off the shoulders of his blazer. "That is what **Operation: Top Gun** is all about. First of all, we observe them today; get a handle on their habits and mannerisms. And if, by the end of the day, it seems like they are indeed romantically involved, we proceed with phase two and _then_ we break them up."

"I thought you said it wasn't _breaking them up_, it was – "

My wingman started miming 'shaking life by the shoulders', but I talked over him.

"Either way, you have got to work on your confidence around her!" His hands froze in mid-air, clenched on life's invisible arms. "No matter how much hard work _I _do, it is all going to be in vain if you do not...what's the phrase? Get your act together and start acting like a man!"

Teddy shoved his hands in his trouser pockets and slumped his way up the back stairs behind me. "You sound like my dad."

This pleased me more than my resolute poker face let him know.

Lux met us at in the empty foyer, wearing a black trenchcoat, big sunglasses, and a scarf over her golden hair, just as I had instructed her to. The rest of the student body was still gathered on brick benches and stone tables in the magnificent front courtyard, so the three of us stood alone under the elegant antique chandelier (French Baroque, I idly noticed) in the security-camera free front entrance hall.

"Hollywood!" I clapped my hands together and beamed at her confusion. "Did you get what I asked for?"

"Yes..." she untied the Juicy Couture scarf from under her chin and folded the sunglasses into her bag. From the bag, she withdrew two manila folders and passed them into my eager hands. "But you can't tell anyone I did this, okay? If Saffron found out I was using her student body president powers for evil other than her own, she would be really, really mad."

I had yet to actually see the infamous _Saffron_, but doubted I would be impressed when I did. She sounded utterly uninteresting.

"Speaking of, I really have to get her office key back to her, or she'll start asking questions..."

I opened the first manila folder, labeled **Kennedy, Scarlett Rose** and nodded. "You are dismissed, Hollywood. Speak of this to no one."

Teddy peered over my shoulder as I found Scarlett's class schedule. "_What _are you doing?"

He looked surprised at my crisp tone, and held both his hands up in bewildered surrender. I handed him the pen and paper he had requested in his limo the night before, and nodded at the schedule in my hands.

"Start copying. We cannot keep these forever or the office secretary will notice they are gone."

"Oh..." He fumbled with the pen and started writing. I took a picture of the page with my cell phone, as my own copy.

The folder underneath read **Sparks, Maverick** **Jude** which answered two of my burning questions. _Maverick __**Sparks**_. I had wondered if perhaps his first name was a nickname for something very plain, like John or maybe even Pete, something that warranted Maverick as a nickname due perhaps to his extreme love of _Top Gun_ or tendency to be reckless and irresponsible – but it was written plainly on his school records. Maverick Sparks. _Sparks_ sounded distantly familiar, but I didn't dwell on it. More important than his surname or his _parents_' obsession with _Top Gun_ was his schedule for that semester, which told me he too was in his 11th year, and that he had the same free period on Fridays that I did.

"Got that?"

I checked Teddy's progress and saw why he liked writing so much more than using technology. His penmanship was excellent and he had managed to copy, word for word, the two sheets of paper I had shown him on one single sheaf of Legal Pad.

"Good."

I handed him Scarlett's folder and instructed him to read through the rest of it for anything interesting.

I flicked through Maverick's file, which was rather thick with disciplinary notes and detention slips, and learned only that he had a younger sister named Delilah, had been suspended three times over the course of his freshman and sophomore years, and had come close to expulsion a grand total of _six_ times. He wasn't considering any Ivy League schools, was not involved in any extracurricular activities, sports, or clubs, had never been on the dean's list or received any scholastic rewards, and had only managed to keep his place at St. Jude's School for Boys due to numerous family donations and because none of his suspensions had been related to federally illegal activities.

He was just the kind of boy I had vowed to stay _away from_. But I was in debt, and my debt _had _to be repaid.

Teddy handed me his manila folder when he finished perusing, and I bound both of them together and hid them in my Prada bag behind the **Operation: Top Gun** instructions, so I could get them back to Lux before the school day let out.

"I can't believe you're doing this for me," Teddy admitted as the two of us sneaked out a side door to join the rest of the school.

I raised an eyebrow at him. "A Waldorf always repays her debt."

"I thought you weren't a Waldorf?" He wrapped his silk scarf around his neck and grinned good-naturedly. "Isn't that your whole point?"

"Mais oui..." I shrugged and spotted Maverick's tall, dark figure across the courtyard. "Until I find out who I am, I can't very well just go by _Elle_. I hate that whole pretentious one-name thing, for one. And it is hardly as impressive as the notoriety being a _Waldorf _affords me, especially in this town."

"I know what you mean..." A look passed over my wingman's face then, something dark and entitled and burdened; it sent a shudder through his eyes and prompted his shoulders to square and his toes to point forward and the creases and wrinkles in his clothes to worriedly straighten themselves out. "It's kind of exhausting."

Then I saw the way nearby girls eyed him – not him, but his dark hair and eyes, the money he had invested in his Gucci shoes and the hard shadows on his face. He was not the most popular boy in school, or the most athletic, or even the best looking, but I realized for the first time in that moment that he was a _Bass_, and that being a Bass must be grueling. Not only did his father own more than half of Manhattan, but Bass Industries probably, in some way or another, employed most of our classmates' parents or siblings or distant twice-removed relatives.

It was a terrifying realization. As a Waldorf, I had status and a famous pedigree; the same old money privileges allotted Lex and Lux for being Archibalds, and therefore Van der Bilts, were given to me wherever I went. Whether in Paris where ma mère was known and respected for her charity work, being a world-class hostess and ruling most of popular society with an iron well-manicured fist, or in New York City where grandmamma's flagship store was a beacon for sophisticated socialites and politicians' wives, the name _Waldorf_ was untarnished platinum.

Bearing the name _Bass_, I imagined, was something akin to Atlas's job holding up the sky.

So, I smiled genuinely at Teddy and nodded in understanding, "It is."

When Lex waved to him from the pavement below us, we parted ways and I scanned the multitude again for my prey: Maverick.

...Jester, rather. _Jester_.

I vowed to remember that better on future missions.

As I drew nearer, I got a better picture of my intended target and realized he was engaged in informal-looking dialogue with a tall, leggy blonde. _Of course_. I doubted there was any other kind of blonde in the world who would chat on front school steps with marginally handsome, cigarette-laden, black coat-wearing, brown haired boys with beautiful cheekbones and full, kissable—or, at least, fairly okay to look at—smirking lips.

Unfortunately for her, I had tangoed with tall, leggy blondes before, and knew exactly how to trounce their special brand of treachery.

"Too close for missiles," I whispered, shedding my winter coat to reveal my carefully selected breezy white blouse (which showed just the _faintest_ outline of my La Perla push-up bra and hinted very slightly at the shadow of my bellybutton) and the tight, navy blue pencil skirt it was tucked into. I had paired the classic look with very dangerous Yves Saint Laurent patent leather 3 ½" peek-a-boo heels. "I'm switching to guns."

His maelstrom eyes—for that was the only way to describe the swirling, dark blue irises that penetrated my thin shirt and stripped me of any modesty I had been pretending to have—caught mine over Blondie's shoulder, and I quirked my red lips automatically. I hadn't _intended_ to smile so freely and instantly, but it worked and who was I to complain about capturing his attention? Whatever conversation Blondie had been taxing him through ground to a halt, and suddenly her steel gaze clashed with mine and I saw the cherubic face of Constance's Queen Bee, the infamous and utterly uninteresting-sounding Saffron No-Last-Name, for the very first time.

As I had predicted I would be, I was unimpressed.

She was angelically and unimaginatively pretty. Soft flaxen locks surrounded her body like a cloud blocking a streaming beam of sunlight, but there was nothing unique in her upturned chin or the slim contours of her nose (which I suspected had been altered by a plastic surgeon's knife at least once), and I knew hers was a face I would memorize then forget as soon as she left my sight.

"New girl."

It was not a question. Her pale eyebrows curved and she judged my outfit with a pathetically untrained eye for detail—I saw her pause to examine the cut of my skirt, not the way it perfectly hugged the outsides of my thighs and made my slim hips seem a bit wider, and she all but ignored the genius of my stylish peak-shouldered double-breasted button front blouse, which created the illusion of a Victorian ingénue. Her eyes settled instead on my slim Valentino signature belt, merely a nice-looking accessory and nowhere near the crux of my ensemble.

"Last season Valentino?" she tutted self-importantly, raising her voice so nearby gaggles of her mindless followers could hear her dress me down. "Try harder next time. I'm afraid your outfit isn't quite up to scratch, sweetie."

A twittering arose around us, but before I could retort that my belt was not _'last season'_, but rather a timeless vintage piece Valentino had _recreated_ the year before, which rooted my outfit in the classic elegance it was meant to invoke, Maverick flicked his cigarette over the balcony we stood on and eyed me up and down again. A luxurious, concentrated stare that settled all too casually on my calves and noticeably appreciated the cut of my collarbone.

Then, my lips felt the burn from those eyes and he leaned against the stone balustrade. "Looks fine to me."

Saffron whirled around, and all I saw before that cloud of hair overtook my vision was the flashing of pearly white teeth. I couldn't see those rosy cheeks or the slant of her head from my position, but I imagined a disgustingly sweet simpering sag on her puckered pink lips as she bleated coquettishly, "Maverick, weren't you about to suggest I let you walk me to class?"

"No."

He was bored with her, and that made me laugh.

"If I were you," Her hard, cold eyes were on me again, and I imagined her fingernails lengthening into talons as her nose sharpened into a beak and wings uncoiled from her back. "I would watch yourself. Just because you're new doesn't mean I'll forgive disrespect."

I fluttered my eyelashes and slid my right foot behind my left to grant her a mocking curtsy. "Next time, tell me a laugh will displease your highness and I will, _of course_..." Her subjects closed in, eye shapes varying between widened and narrowed, and one of the younger ones looked like she was about to faint at my sign of insubordination. "...Laugh louder."

The repeated intakes of breath told me she had found a bag to breath into or an inhaler to calm herself with.

Saffron drew herself up to her full height and gave me her best contemptuous frown. I faked a polite yawn.

Teddy had not been exaggerating in ma mère's old bedroom when he'd told me of Constance Billard's social hierarchy. 'Set in stone, no challenging it' was the phrase he had used, and I learned in that short exchange how very apt this description was. Saffron was very clearly not used to insurrection, and this made her very weak, even with her huddle of minions standing nearby to offer support.

I remembered Sophie standing up at the top of the steps and shaking her head very slowly at me where I stood on the ground below. Even then, in my defeat, I had respected the freezing, honest, naked emotion in her eyes—the unspoken conversation between us on those crowded steps that told me I was finished, I had lost, that I was at her mercy. As a newly crowned queen, my friend was nothing short of magnificent and unforgiving, and I quickly retreated through a side door to let her hold her court, accepting my fate and knowing with dread that my life could only get worse from there.

I had been right, of course.

But Saffron stood across from me in silence that was not definitive, just a noiseless scramble for witty words.

I examined her clothing the way she had done mine, appreciating her ability to match blacks, but finding her pleated skirt uninspired and ill-fitting—its high waist made her willowy frame seem waspish and sickly. Ma mère's shrewd eye for detail crackled at the base of my skull and I heard her voice whisper _her shoes, Ellie, her shoes_. And when I saw them, I couldn't help but laugh again.

"Last season Prada?" More gasps arose from the thick throng of onlookers. "Adorable."

I felt the shiver go through her court. And when the bell rang and no one moved, I took the few steps required to pass their queen to Maverick, who looked uninterested just behind her, and leaned against the rampart beside him. A teacher called out from an upper-level window, and an explosion of whispers and nervous chirrups peppered the sound of shoes clicking and scuffing against the flagstone.

I sensed rather than witnessed Saffron take her leave, but I was glad when her presence no longer choked my sanity. _What a piece of work_.

"I have been thinking," I said innocuously, as if a showdown had not just taken place three paces away from him, "and you owe me an apology."

"Do I?" He barely inclined his chin towards me. "What makes you think so?"

"It takes two to cause a collision." I leaned my chin on my fist and never took my eyes off his profile. "Je suis désolé. Now, you go."

A string tugged and lifted the corner of his lips, and I noticed a dimple appeared beneath his cheek. "I'm sorry you're unobservant."

_Bingo_.

He was amused at me, which put me _far_ above Saffron. If he and Scarlett _were _some kind of couple, he was either too flirtatious for their own good or they were on the verge of becoming non-exclusive; and it was easy to tell that his one admirer I might have been afraid to go up against was no one to worry about. It would be all too easy to deliver the death blow to their (hopefully) floundering relationship and open Scar—Viper up to a world of blissful happiness with someone who truly adored her: my wingman, Goose.

Of course, the swiftness with I could imagine her becoming a free agent meant Teddy would need to face her sooner rather than later. I would confirm my suspicions later, either by finding Scarlett in the girls' hallway and casually inquiring about her love life, or by making a non-threatening move on him in front of her and gauging her reaction.

_Oh_ how much fun it was to have something to take my mind off my family predicament!

I was less grateful when Maverick pushed himself away from the stonework and checked the lingering crowds. "I've got to find Scarlett and take her to class," he swiped a hand through his dark hair and I silently cursed myself for not working faster. Why had I given him that long pause!? I had hoped it would be companionable, not effectively end the conversation and simultaneously dash my flourishing plans. "Hope I don't read about you in the obits tomorrow."

Long strides carried him away before I could retort.

_Merde. Merde, merde, merde, merde. Merde!_

"Merde..."

Shorter, more pensive steps took me in the direction of the front double-doors. A hand darted out from beside the railing just as I reached the bottom step that led up into the school, and I was yanked rather roughly into the shadows by a frantic looking Lux.

"_What have you done_?!" I thought she was about to pull clumps of her hair out of her skull, but was more concerned for my less sturdy brand-new extensions when she started waving her shaking hands around like a mad street corner fortune teller. "Are you complete and utterly _completely_ out of her mind? I thought you were _smart_. Saffron is going to _kill me_." Then, Lux began pacing and running her fingers repeatedly through her hair while speaking in a lilting, panicky voice, and she reminded me so markedly of both her parents in a crisis situation that I couldn't help grinning. "This isn't funny, Elle! You don't _talk to her_ like that. You don't _talk_ to her! She's...she's...she's...she's the _queen_ and her word is law, and if this was Alice in Wonderland you'd have your head chopped off right now!"

She drew a forefinger across her throat to illustrate.

"Oh, please," I rested my weight against the side of the stairs. "Saffron would look _horrendous_ in red."

Lux's eyes practically popped out of her head. "So _not_ the bloody point!"

"Did you just say 'bloody'?" I smiled affectionately. "Are we in England, all of a sudden? If so, mon Dieu, please get me out of here."

"No we are not in England!" Her Coach heel broke on the masonry when she stamped her foot impatiently.

"I have flats to bicycle home in," I offered graciously, but Lux's meltdown continued.

"If we _were_ in England, I wouldn't be so afraid for your immortal soul because England is a constitutional monarchy and the monarch doesn't hold the power! This is _Constance_ and this is an _absolute monarchy_! Divine right of queens! No mercy! Off with your head, total social destruction, torture and cannibalization and _humiliation_. Do you understand what you've done?"

I pulled my file out of my purse and scrubbed obsessively at a tiny imperfection in my nails. "I do. I stood up to someone who hasn't ever been stood up to before, and it was priceless. Did you see her face?" I gaped like a fish for a moment to recreate the scene for Lux, who might not have been close enough to fully appreciate my uprising. "Her? A queen? Please."

"No, no, no." Lux paced even faster, shaking her head hysterically. "You have to apologize. Make peace with her! I'm already on the bottom of the heap, here, Elle. If she finds out how close we are and that I _helped _you, using _her office key_, then my reputation will never recover. She'll utterly ruin me and I'll just...I'll just be absolutely nothing, okay?"

This gave me pause. '_Absolutely nothing_' sounded very hopeless from her shaking lips, and the desperation that distorted her normally smooth face into a rather Picasso-esque reproduction of itself made me think that perhaps Saffron wasn't _quite_ as harmless as I thought. It was possible that I had merely taken her off-guard and her full strength would rise up in a swell of calculated anger once she stopped reeling at my outrageous candor.

Then again, it was also probable that Lux, bless her well-intentioned heart, was overreacting.

A _lot_.

"You just...you just can't really expect to get away with this." She collapsed against the stairs next to me and buried her face in her hands. Through her fingers, she mumbled, "She is going to be so mad, she's going to be absolutely furious...end of me...so embarrassing... God, Elle!" Her eyes peered from over the tops of her nails. "What are you trying to do to me? Are you just messing with her? Are you trying to make things like they were at your old school? Do you think you can just trade off the throne every week with shocking displays of dominance?"

I wrapped my arms around her and patted her back comfortingly. "Oh, chéri, of course I am not going to share the throne with her."

The utter relief that fluttered through Lux's body at hearing that cannot be described by the sigh she released, or by the way she went completely slack in my embrace. I smiled and ran smoothing fingers through her haphazard blonde tresses, soothing her stress by gently rubbing circles into the top of her scalp.

"I am going to steal it."

Lux promptly fainted.


	26. Newton's First Law of Motion

**A/N: **To all the sweet, grammatically challenged trolls in the world: chapter 26 goes out to you, and thank you for all the entertainment. =]

Also, just the usual reminder: I DO NOT OWN GOSSIP GIRL. That's that.

xoxo

"_An object in motion continues in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force."  
_

**CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX**_  
Newton's First Law of Motion_

After days and days of tailing Maverick and Scarlett, aka subjects Jester and Viper, I had no idea whether or not they were a couple.

They were very touchy-feely, as I chronicled in my Wednesday field report after I witnessed them sitting together on the stoop of an apartment building for almost an hour and a half. His arm had been around her shoulders, either to shield her from the cold or keep her head resting comfortably on his shoulder or both, but her hands had stayed clasped in her lap, and the only lip contact I had been able to verify from my post behind a Buick across the street had been one-way from Maverick's mouth to Scarlett's forehead.

I also noticed they didn't laugh very much, and many times they sat or walked or ate in companionable silence.

They shared a lot of things, like cigarettes and engraved Zippo lighters, bites and sips of half-eaten meals and cooling cups of coffee, and little glances I never would have noticed had I not been sitting a table away peering at them from over the top of an old _Wall Street Journal_ Teddy had let me borrow.

He let her wear his helmet when they rode away on his motorcycle, and when they did that I lost them. My six-speed could never keep up.

Both of them liked to wear leather—jackets, boots, belts, bracelets, necklaces, even trousers. They smoked like chimneys, carried varnished flasks in their interior jacket pockets, and enjoyed strange ancient vinyl indie rock that they bought half-price in dingy record stores, and that sounded to _me_ like too many drums and excessive amounts of incoherent yelling.

I could never hear anything they said to each other when I walked behind them in my nondescript headscarf and oversized Chanel shades, because they spoke quietly to each other, inclining their chins and whispering out of the corners of their mouths.

Their lips never touched, but the intimacy in their eyes, in their fingers, that flowed between their bodies and turned their hips towards each other whenever they hugged a little too long and parted in the early hours of the morning...it told a different story. That Thursday night, after one such goodbye, I stuck around and tried to look inconspicuous where I was leaning against a flickering lamppost. They lived near each other in the East Village, in the tenement buildings at the end of St. Mark's Place between Third Avenue and Avenue A; _very_ downtown.

So downtown, in fact, that I wondered how they endured the commute to school. He never gave her a ride—she and the mousy brown-haired bespectacled girl always arrived a little before the morning bell in the same silver Mercedes, and Maverick always rounded the block and walked her to class after parking his sleek black motorcycle near the back entrance.

He never carried her books—never even offered. And Scarlett never asked. They didn't eat lunch together, either, and they never waved to each other at the end of the day as they headed in different directions. I never once observed them hold hands, smile at each other, or look even remotely amorous.

But every afternoon, after they had both changed and had time to freshen up after school, he picked her up at her curbside and drove them to Yaffa Café or the corner of St. Mark's Place and Second Avenue for cigarettes and fountain egg creams at Gem Spa; to Trash & Vaudeville for neon-bright kitschy shoes and accoutrements and high-end punk/rock/goth/glam-styled clothing I recognized from Aunt Jenny's _Raccoon Eyes_ and various other counter culture labels; to St. Mark's Comics where I hovered behind a shelf and listened to them discuss characters from a graphic novel for almost three uninterrupted hours; and to a number of Japanese restaurants and bars, where they ordered dangerous drink combinations and chuckled bitterly over various conversations I, again, could not hear above the surrounding din.

And that Thursday night, when they had eaten and smoked and drank and barely touched and spoken privately about things I could only guess about, he walked her home and she hugged him so tightly and for so long that I thought a kiss was imminent. Then, his lips grazed the top of her head, he rubbed his hands over her arms, and then he waited on the sidewalk as she turned her key in the door and disappeared behind it.

I ducked my head and watched from beneath my street light as he took a seat on the bottom of her stoop and, bathed in shadows that cut across his face like sharpened knives, lit a cigarette to satiate his _in_satiable craving. And he sat, and sat, and sat, and monitored the street corners like a watchdog for hours, seemingly waiting for someone to turn the corner and give him an excuse to spring up and attack. A carton of cigarettes died between his lips and fingers before he stood, shook out his leather jacket, and meandered the short distance to his own door.

I decided, as I waved my arm and caught a taxi back to 74th Street, that I would focus on Scarlett the next day. She seemed to be a fan of Asian cuisine, and it just so happened I saw a timely lunchtime craving for sushi in my near future. The conversation developed full-fledged in my mind by the time my cab came to a stop at the Archibald townhouse, and by the next morning as I brushed my hair and constructed a new daringly fashionable outfit, I knew exactly what questions I needed to ask to find out—once and for all—if Scarlett Rose/Kennedy was dating Maverick Sparks.

While I mentally worked out a few of the minor kinks in my brilliant plan, I slid my fingers down the polished mahogany staircase banister and let the altogether pleasantly high-caloric smell of Aunt Jenny's famous Eggs Benedict, freshly brewed pot of strong coffee, and sizzling slices of lightly browned ham waft under my nose.

Teddy had spent the night in one of the guest rooms after a marathon of video games and banana coffee cake with Lex, and I wondered if he was already at breakfast—perhaps he would call his limo and I could convince him to give me a ride? I loved my bicycle, but it would be nice to sit on a plush leather seat and just close my eyes to relax before a grueling day of reconnaissance.

And...very important college preparatory education. Of course.

Voices drifted after the typical morning perfume, down the hallway from the kitchen, and I was surprised to hear both my godfather _and_ Jenny conversing with someone I did not recognize. The thumps from behind Lux's door assured me she was still upstairs scrapping together an outfit I wouldn't ridicule too harshly, the steam coming from beneath Lex's bathroom door confirmed he was either getting clean or smoking an early joint, and Teddy had told me he never ate breakfast unless his household staff cooked it according to his preferred specifications, so I could only wonder at this mystery person's identity before I rounded through the doorway and saw her.

Elegantly graying blonde hair pulled into a chic chignon at the back of her head, Lily van der Woodsen was enjoying a cup of tea at the breakfast table and discussing a devastating disagreement between two sponsors of a catered affair she had been planning for months—the cotillion, I realized, remembering Eric had told me she was in charge of its hosting committee.

"Elle," Jenny smiled as I poured myself a cup of coffee and added liberal amounts of cream. "This is Lily van der Woodsen."

"I know." I had never really _met_ her—I had simply heard stories, seen pictures, even eaten Thanksgiving dinner at the same table. Even if I _hadn't_ been afforded those tidbits, she was a legendary Manhattan socialite and heiress, prominent in charity circles and a well-known champion of hopeless causes. The only way I could have been ignorant of her existence for sixteen years was if I had lived the majority of my life beneath a very heavy and isolated rock. "Nice to meet you."

"Enchanté," Her eyes lingered on mine for several long moments, before her delicate hands clenched and lifted her cup of tea to her tightly pursed lips. "I've come to speak with you about my committee's annual debutante ball—Eric mentioned you might want to attend."

I smiled very slightly on the outside, but on the _inside_ I was bubbling over with lethal amounts of happiness. He really had never let me down.

"Of course," she set her cup down on its matching saucer, and folded her hands over the table. "It's very unusual, as your family is overseas and you've been absent for the majority of the dancing classes and deportment lessons..."

My pulse briefly quickened in trepidation—what if she wasn't there to _invite _me, but to inform me that my attendance would be most inappropriate and fly in the face of everything she and society stood for and exactly who did I think I was, trying to worm my way onto the debutante list through not-even familial connections?

'_I'm Elle Waldorf_,' I would anxiously reply with faux confidence, hoping perhaps that would be a good enough reason to don a gown and dance my way to Serena and the knowledge she could grant me. But what if it _wasn't_ enough? What if being a Waldorf really wasn't enough?

What if I couldn't get through the doors and Serena flew away to London before I could even let her know I was in New York?

What if I was doomed to live the rest of my teenage life in a guest room at the Archibald townhouse, attend drama school in the States, and waste away under the hot lights of Broadway without any real awareness of who I was, what I was meant to accomplish, where I fit in the world without a mother, a father, or a last name I could call my own?

What if I was condemned to just be _Elle_, to walk through life as a tacky pretentious _one namer _and adopt buckets and buckets of underprivileged kids from third word countries to care for and nurture and pretend to establish a family with? What if I was meant to always say _'Je ne sais pas'_ when asked about my family tree and its bare branches?

What if I was no one of any importance?

What if Misty was just a pretty middle name ma mère had perchance happened to give me?

What if the picture didn't exist and the diary didn't exist, and my world didn't exist, and I was really living the whole experience from a padded cell in the depths of a psychiatric ward?

What if I was just plain _nobody_?

"Eleanor?" Lily's mouth was drawn into a thin line again, and I blinked myself out of my rapidly deteriorating delusions. "I was just saying that since you came out in Paris at the end of the summer and meet all our goodwill qualifications, I would like to extend a personal invitation to this winter's Dispensary Cotillion and Debutante Ball."

_Oh, Dieu_.

My heart slowed down as I remembered that forgotten piece of information—my Parisian debut on Tristan's arm seemed like a lifetime away, almost as if it had happened to an entirely different girl.

"The committee is always looking for girls to generate interest in the foundation, and a French debutante with such an influential mother who _also_ debuted at our ball... We would be honored to have you."

She slid a cream colored invitation across the table towards me, and I accepted it with trembling, excited hands.

"Merci beaucoup," I managed to keep from gushing too profusely, but I couldn't help but beam. She undoubtedly assumed it was at the prospect of donning a beautiful dress and twirling around on a dance floor like a music box ballerina for all of society to enjoy, but my true joy rested in the thought that I was really going to see Serena. I was really going to get to ask her questions and get her answers, and learn the truth. So, when I said 'merci beaucoup' to her beautiful, graceful, generous mother, I _really_ meant it. "I would love to attend."

Lily stood and gave me a slanted nod. "I'll catch you up on all of the important details at the next dancing lesson."

The papers inside the accompanying cream envelope laid out the itinerary in a very organized manner—Dorota would have loved it.

On December 12th, the schedule informed me, there would be a Sunday mother-daughter brunch at a catering spot off Fifth Avenue, followed by a Friday night party in the Grand Ballroom of the Plaza Hotel. Both events were meant to test the debutantes' social graces and display the outcome of months and months of etiquette classes and lifetimes of perfect breeding. I, of course, had been through the dog-and-pony show months before, in flowing white Oleg Cassini at Paris's _premiere _debutante ball, and was finally grateful for the horrendous experience.

It had ensured my place in line with Manhattan's elite society girls, and it meant a hefty reward for my years of _searching_ and hopeless waiting.

The only problem was the mother-daughter brunch, which I would either have to attend all by myself (an act of social suicide, I was sure) or ask Jenny to accompany me to, as she was technically my _interregnum_ mother.

...Maybe I could hire an out-of-work Equity actress.

Or, I pondered, taking the envelope and my cup of coffee back to my bedroom and packing up my schoolbag for the daily commute, I could simply _not_ _go_. Just skip the brunch and the Plaza Hotel party and arrive at the ball in my full glory, a renegade deb with no interest in informing the world about her good deeds and future ambitions or twirling dizzying circles to the tune of an expensive orchestral band. What I was really concerned about, more than what I would wear or how I would do my hair or what I would write about myself or how I would match my accessories to my dress, was whose arm I would be on when I descended the stairs and smiled for the flashing cameras.

The invitation included a catalog of eligible escorts, listed in alphabetical order by the school they attended. I decided to read it during French class, which Queller had refused to let me out of and which was slowly draining my will to live.

Teddy had left before sunrise to fetch a fresh pair of clothes from his house, so I was left to my usual bicycle route. I saw a few of Saffron's minions as I pedaled up 5th Avenue, and the mixed expressions of awe and terror gave me an energy boost my cup of coffee had failed to provide—the throne was ripe for the stealing, as long as I could put my charisma to use and convert her diligent and naïve army of simpletons to my cause.

But first, a date.

During Madam Duvall's atrocious lesson on subjunctive verbs ("_Il est nécessaire que vous __mangiez__ tous les jours_," she had us recite, as she scraped the sentence on the chalkboard and offended my eyes with the run in her dark tan hose), I mouthed the words automatically, and ignored her diagrams and scientific dissections as I ran my eyes down the list of St. Jude's boys and discovered that Lex was on the list, along with a few names I didn't recognize, and one name I did.

_Maverick Sparks_—Junior.

It was hard to picture him in tails and white gloves, but I didn't mind the image when it did form in my mind's eye—it was no secret to myself or Lux's stuffed animals that I found him incredibly physically attractive, and the prospect of gliding around with him at my side was deliciously appealing and also made me wonder if he didn't mind horse-drawn carriages or matching his tie to my dress.

...Of course, if he was escorting Scarlett, whose name I saw on the accompanying debutante list beneath _Constance Billard School for Girls_, I would have to go with dispassionate Lex and he would _never_ match his tie to my dress, and he thought horse-drawn carriages were tourist-laden traps of evil.

The best way to find out Maverick's cotillion plans was to ask him, and when the bell rang early because it was Friday and signaled the beginning of my much anticipated free period, I rushed to my locker and absentmindedly turned the little key in its lock as I peered through the adjacent floor-to-ceiling window into the interior courtyard below.

_Aha!_

He was already lounging at stone table, smoking a cigarette in flagrant violation of school policy, his tie undone and his shirt untucked in deliberate defiance of the dress code, his hair curling around his ears and very nearly exceeding the school handbook's regulations on suitable length and style. I hurried to shove my books in their appropriate places so I could sit across from him before anyone else got the chance, but just as I turned the lock and heard it click tight behind my key, _she_ floated through the girls' doorway and strolled purposefully slow to him so he could appreciate the full effect of her short skirt and extraordinarily tacky calfskin boots.

"Slut," I griped, ignoring the scandalized look of offense on a passing freshman's face, and crossing my arms over my chest. And, just when I thought it was merely remarkably bad luck that had her out of class at the same time as us and cornering him in the interior courtyard at the exact same time I had intended to corner him in the interior courtyard, she flipped her downy white hair over her cashmere-clad shoulder, caught my eye through the window, and _smirked_.

"Bitch!" I gritted my teeth and glared at the sophomore who stopped and asked if I was talking to her.

Then, instead of sitting _across_ from him like any respectable non-slut bitch would have done, she put her spiky heels on the bench he was sitting on and slid her lopsided ass onto the table and _crossed _her spidery long legs towards him and made sure to flash the tops of her tacky striped stockings that didn't go with the pattern on her skirt at ALL and in fact looked horrible with her top and I knew exactly how much I absolutely loathed her and her undeserved rank as 'Queen Bee'.

Please. _Please_. What was the world coming to?

Maverick spared her a glance and parted his lips only when she poked and prodded him to, but I saw the strained little line in his back and knew all was not lost. Either he was annoyed at another girl hitting on him when he had a girlfriend he never kissed or seemed to have sex with or even spoke to during school hours, or the hair's breadth proximity to Saffron was genuinely putting him off.

I liked to think it was the second one, especially since _my_ stockings were red and paired with a jaunty little polka-dot bow tie that complimented the dainty aqua blue rose pendant that hung from a gold chain around my neck and nestled just perfectly in the hidden cleavage beneath my pretty white cardigan, and I knew I looked exceptionally tasty.

Using my body to persuade men was an art I had wanted to stop practicing, but it was undoubtedly effective. And I needed effective.

Accordingly, I adjusted my bow tie so it was just the right amount off-kilter, made sure there were no unseemly scuffs on my patent leather heels, and imitated the runway gait Scarlett Rose had perfected on the catwalks of Paris and Milan as I pushed open the courtyard door and honed in on those sharp cheekbones beneath that forever scruffy dark hair...and those dark blue eyes that always made me wish—feel! Feel. _Feel_ that I was standing in a dimly lit room surrounded by pools of candle wax clad in nothing but very suggestive lingerie.

Saffron's laugh rose above the chirping groups of friends that littered the granite tables and neatly arranged cobblestones, but Maverick's mouth remained in its permanent neutral frown that seemed to always border on the verge of a full blown scowl when he was particularly agitated, and a taunting sneer when he was in a fairly decent mood. Not that I had noticed on purpose, or anything, but days of covert operations had unwittingly imparted me with a bit of entirely accidental knowledge!

Rather than breaking up their tête-à-tête as I had done days earlier, I simply strode past, taking long steps to accentuate the _swoosh _of my skirt as it brushed teasingly over my thighs and revealed just enough of my hips to show off my figure to its full advantage. The push-up bra didn't hurt, either. When I felt his eyes on me, I settled myself at the bench next to his and withdrew my extremely old paperback copy of _Le Petit Prince_ from the depths of my Kate Spade messenger bag.

I didn't look at him, but I did lick my lips and tilt my head so that the arch of my neck and dip between my clavicles were more apparent beneath my collar—when I heard their conversation screech to a grinding halt and realized the angry click-clack of cheap boots on expensive stonework was getting closer and closer, I smiled victoriously and turned my sparklingly jubilant eyes to the crackling and hateful glare that spat at me from the pits of Saffron's irises.

"New girl," she put her hands on her hips and I swore her upper lip curled when she noticed my pleasant smile. "You can't sit here."

"Oh?" I glanced around for a large group of friends who had intended to use it as their meeting place, or a sign that read ELLE WALDORF IS NOT ALLOWED TO SIT HERE, but the courtyard was mysteriously lacking this evidence. "Hmm...strange. I assumed from the complete _lack_ of people surrounding it, plus the fact that there is no sign of ownership anywhere that _I_ can see, that I _could_ sit here. Unless you meant that I'm physically incapable of sitting here," I shrugged, crossing my legs and resting my chin on my fist to indicate that I had no intention of moving, "which clearly I am not. So, I fail to see your reasoning, Your Travesty."

Her eyes narrowed and she leaned down, supporting her weight on one sprawled hand and coming so close to me that our noses practically touched. "Listen up, sweetie. You showed some frightening suicidal tendencies the other day, in front of a large crowd of very interested witnesses. It would be a _shame_," she dropped her voice to a breathy whisper, trying to capture an essence of inoffensive Marilyn Monroe and failing miserably, "if, when they found your body in the supply closet, no one was surprised. All they'd be able to say is _poor girl, we all saw it coming_..."

I let out a loud burst of laughter that sent her back into a straight line and deepened the crinkle between her eyes.

"You are truly threatening to _really_ kill me?" I had never been so unable to control my craving to laugh rudely and loudly in someone's shocked face, but I managed to keep my quirking lips in check as I white-knuckled the dog-eared corners of my book and stared at her cherubic face in disbelief. "I shouldn't be surprised; you do _not _seem the type to appreciate the subtleties of a well-worded allegory, but _honestly_. An authentic death threat?"

And then the dam ruptured and the sniggers exploded from behind my nose. A few heads swiveled around, but I didn't raise my voice loud enough for any eavesdroppers to hear.

"Yes," she tried to appear unruffled, but I saw the frazzle in her tensing fingers and knew she had been caught off-guard once again. Had scary words and bland threats actually carried her to the throne? I seriously doubted the judgment of _every _student at Constance Billard and wondered if it was even worth being their queen if their taste was so obviously injudicious. "And if you don't stop trying to steal Maverick away from me, it won't be a _threat_ anymore."

This was a perfect opportunity to confirm or deny my theory, and despite the fact that I hated the source, I lifted my chin off my fist and slanted it up to her. "Away from _you_? Isn't he with Scarlett?"

"My slutty sister?" Saffron snorted rudely and looked disgusted.

This caught _me_ off-guard. Saffron was Scarlett's sister? Scarlett _had_ a sister? Scarlett had a monstrously _bitchy_ sister? No wonder she seized the opportunity to be a fashion model and tour the world—manic magazine editors-in-chief and psychotic perfectionist photographers had to be welcome company compared to the shrew Fate had dealt her.

"Please. Maverick thinks of her as a boy or something. _I'm_ the Kennedy he wants to take to cotillion."

How the two of them could debut at the same time—not to mention the complete lack of obvious physical resemblance—was a mystery I stored away for another time, because _phase one_ of **Operation: Top Gun** had just come to a close. Subjects Viper and Jester were completely platonic, just as I had hoped and assumed, which meant all I had to do was coach Teddy to say a few dashing phrases and convince Scarlett he was a fine escort, and I would be completely debt-free!

I wouldn't even have to pursue Maverick Sparks. I could stay away from him and all boys just like him, just as I had intended ever since Sophie's coronation and Tristan's manipulative betrayal. I didn't _need_ a man in my life, other than my possible father and very possible brother, and my godfather.

And my god brother.

And my grandfathers.

And saba.

And...

No _romantic_ boys. I didn't need a romantic interest.

I was a Waldorf (for the time being), and Waldorfs _never _defined themselves by men!

Saffron traipsed back to her quarry, but his eyes stayed on me. I withheld a gulp when he licked his own lips, mimicking my earlier action, and slowly drummed his long, ivory-tickling fingers against his textbooks.

I _did not_ need him. I would ask Lex to escort me, and he would say yes, and it would be fun. I didn't need an actual date. It wasn't even my real debut, after all, and I wasn't going there to be swept up in the magic or enjoy a perfect evening with the perfect prince charming in the perfect dress, or any of that nonsense. It was strictly an informational mission with very fabulous clothes and glittering accessories. My name would appear in the society pages for a few weeks, but it was not as big a deal as meeting with my very own fairy godmother and pulling her aside for a good, healthy interrogation over sparkling white wine.

Maverick Sparks was...totally unnecessary.

Totally.

I could even go to cotillion _alone_, without a _man_, be introduced on my own—on my own merits, without worrying if my date was rich enough, handsome enough, refined enough, important enough to impress a roomful of people I did not know and did not _care_ to know.

Totally inconsequential.

And if I did take a date, it would be Lex. Obviously. Not Maverick.

What kind of stupid name was that, anyway? 'Maverick'. What parent would saddle their child with that awful moniker?

_Maverick and Elle._ It didn't roll of the tongue; it would sound horrible from the podium, to the gallery of expectant charity presidents and wilting society matrons. _Eleanor Misty Waldorf, daughter of no one we can actually confirm, escorted by Maverick Sparks._ No, no, it didn't have flair to it; no resounding ring that vibrated in the eardrum long after its pronouncement... Much more impressive-sounding would be _Eleanor Misty Waldorf, daughter of Chuck and Misty Bass, escorted by Alexander William Archibald_. Much better.

Much better.

Perfect, in fact.

A real life fairytale come true! He would be dashing and upright and I would glow in haute couture, and we would dance and flatter and impress everyone with our natural beauty and easy friendship. We would be the toast of the event, actually! The shining beacon of interest for all the little gossip columnists to buzz about over Sunday coffee.

Perfect. _Eleanor Waldorf, escorted by Alexander Archibald._

It was settled.

...

"Would you like to escort me to cotillion?"

I came up behind Maverick as the bell rang for lunch and he made his way to the door of St. Jude's.

"Cotillion?" He turned on his heel, one hand resting on the strap of his book bag, the other buried casually in his pocket. "Are you serious?"

I remembered Saffron's deplorable attempt at a contemptuous sneer and her instruction that I would die a brutal death should I 'steal' him away from her. I remembered another tall, willowy goddess with the world at her stilettos and a dark-haired specimen of everything I had ever wanted in a man at her side. I remembered those words, shouted after me as I ran from that abandoned music room and tried not to let the world see my glassy eyes...

I remembered everything that had been taken from me, and I remembered accepting defeat with a worm of fear crawling through my insides.

"Oui," I nodded, tossing my hair and straightening my posture. "I'm very serious."

He retraced his steps and stood not one foot in front of me, that hair falling carelessly in the eyes that left patches of heat wherever they rested their gaze, those lips parted only barely over smooth, pearly teeth, those dimples etched so artistically in the corners of his mouth as it tilted into a dangerously crooked smirk, and he leaned in so close I felt the fringes of his scorching desert-dry and tobacco-scented breath caress my cheek.

"And why should I escort _you_, princess?"

The only answer I could think of that sounded convincing enough was, "Look at me."

He did. Then his smirk became a grin, and his grin became that straight neutral line, and his wink fell on blank eyes. Then, he left.

_Merde_. He had walked away from me four times, twice after almost knocking me over, another two times leaving unresolved issues hanging in the air behind him. _I_ had wanted to be the one to walk away that time, sashay slowly across the courtyard and give him a chance to survey the merchandise from all angles before he decided to close the deal. How dare he walk away first! It was just the sort of thing Tristan would have done.

And I realized quite violently that I needed to stop.

I needed to stop _right then_.

Lex would accompany me, as I had already imagined, and it would be a fun evening for the two of us to just enjoy each other's company as we had not done in so long. He would make whispered remarks about how boring it was to do the waltz four times in one hour, and I would laugh and tell him not to look so blasé in front of the artificial royalty. He would twirl me around at an improper moment, eliciting shocked gasps from retired socialites in the upper galleries, and the good little housewives would gossip and chirrup from their seats at their expensive tables. I would make fun of various girls' gowns and he would let me, smiling fondly and lowering me into an effortless dip at the end of some ostentatious foxtrot.

It would be boring, and safe, and easy.

Just what I needed.

That night, I abandoned my homework halfway through and opened my laptop to Gossip Girl's neglected webpage. It guaranteed me it was my one and only source into the scandalous lives of Manhattan's elite on the Upper East Side, where she and her friends once lived, played, and slept—sometimes with each other. It enticed me to enter her world: a world where everyone was gorgeous, everything was fabulous...

And jealousy and betrayal were everywhere I looked.

I knew I could translate the website into French and replaced the names with ones I was more familiar with, and every story in those archives would read like a brilliant parallel of modern day life and tragedy. Fashions changed and resurfaced and evolved and mutated, music fads came and went and some became classics while classics became oldies and others faded away completely, people met and loved and grew apart and never spoke again, nations went to war and their men and women died for causes no one could remember, but teenagers were always, _always_ the center of the universe.

Grown-ups looked back on their youth with fondness and a wistful desire to travel back in time and stay there. People felt so defined by their roles in high school because they heard parents and teachers and relatives and strangers expounding on their own four years four _decades_ later. Television shows put adults masquerading as teenagers pretending to be adults in extreme situations and touted their pushed boundaries in the name of _entertainment _and_ ratings_, and everyone fell in line because, after all, weren't those the best years of their lives?

I was only sixteen and I was already aching to move on. There had to be better things the grown-ups didn't tell us about because they were too focused on us living our lives the way they were never able to live theirs; there had to be more after you turned twenty and left that dirty word _teen_ behind forever.

I didn't want my life to be the same as ma mère's, or Nate's or Jenny's, or even Chuck Bass's. I wanted it to be mine.

The only problem was, I was stuck in limbo until cotillion, flying on autopilot and destined to remain listlessly airborne until someone signaled me to come in for landing, and no external force could ground me early. I knew I would have to content myself with my little time-wasting missions—getting Scarlett and Teddy together, spending more time with Lex, figuring out just why Nate and Aunt Jenny preferred to refer to each other as '_him_' and '_her_' and '_he_' and '_she_' with hardly secret resentment choking their throats, stealing Saffron's throne and teaching Lux not to be such a pushover...

It was all well and good, and it gave me focus. But those missions only passed the long and lifeless hours, clouded my brain with plans and schemes and stupid typed-up agendas and stolen callsigns so I could go to bed exhausted and sleep so hard the dreams wouldn't come. The dreams that possessed my body and drew bruises on my knuckles when I woke in desperate tiredness the morning after.

The bathroom was cool and dark when I sank beneath the bubbles and tried to clear my mind.

_Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant  
Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant -- et c'est mon droit  
Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant_

I vaguely heard that ring tone blaring from over my head as my back slid against polished porcelain and I gripped the smooth edges of the tub. My fingers grew numb and flashing black-and-white dots swam in front of my eyes, and by the time I was dry heaving and aching from my every sweat-clogged pore, I completely blacked out. The ring tone was the last thing I comprehended before my head hit the tile...

_Wait_...

My eyes flew open and I realized I was perfectly fine. I was enjoying a soothing bath, and soon I would be safe in the embrace of bedclothes and silky pajamas that cradled and stroked and didn't intrude or suffocate my skin. The cologne rose from my bathwater and invaded my mind, making me see things and imagine I was doing things that I couldn't possibly be doing. Making me hear things I couldn't possibly be hearing...

_Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant -- il est mon roi  
Oui c'est mon amant, et alors maman  
Oui c'est mon amant, et alors maman -- laisse-le moi  
Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant  
Oui c'est mon amant, c'est mon amant -- il est à moi_

I took a calming breath; surely my mobile was only acting up—it was about time I got a new one anyway.

It couldn't be him.

The screen lit my face in the romantic candlelight.

A tiny picture of a phone, and an ellipsis signaling an incoming call.

**TRISTAN MARCHAND**.

_Accepter_ read the left side of the screen; _Rejeter _read the right.

I threw my mobile at the wall and did not breathe until I heard the clatter as it shattered on the ground, until I heard that melody end.


	27. Cruel Intentions

**A/N:** I might not have access to my computer for a few days, so I thought I'd get this up ASAP. Enjoy! A lot of stuff happens in this one, so I hope it tides you over if I _do_ lose my computer to the shop for however long I might lose it. I've still got e-mail on my phone, though, so I'll be able to receive notifications of reviews, author alerts, story alerts, etc... So don't hesitate to drop a line. ;]

xoxo

**CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN**_  
Cruel Intentions_

_He found me hiding in the deserted music room, and for around five minutes we populated it with profound silence. I did not want to speak, because there was nothing I could say without exciting the flicker of fear that still curled around my back and choked the base of my throat. He did not want to speak because he had _everything_ to say, and 'everything' was an awful lot to organize on what I assumed was short notice._

_Sophie had sent him, I supposed, either to deliver my punishment or begin a peace accord._

_I toyed only idly with that second thought, knowing it led to me waiting on her hand and foot and following wherever she lead from then until the end of my Janson career. I imagined myself dressed stylishly but never more so than her, my hair done prettily but never more beautifully than hers, my shoes purchased only after receiving her expressed permission..._

_Option A was infinitely more appealing, even with the utter isolation that came with being a pariah._

_When he did speak, it was in his normal voice, with his normal inflection and facial expressions, the same casual sweep of his hand when he accentuated a point, the familiar upturn of his predatory sneer when he spoke of the big, fat scheme he had been carefully basting with David and Leon ever since the three of them had heard of my bet with Sophie._

_Only, their plan had been formed with several conditions he had failed to mention on my balcony the misty evening before._

_In fact, everything he had told me had been a con—a lie—a test. And I had failed._

_Of course Eve would never permit David to carry on a relationship with Sophie, not as long as the two of them were so blissfully and sickeningly happy with just each other. As if Leon would share a conquest with someone else, especially a close friend. And obviously Sophie had been a virgin that night in the opulent jardin de Vivienne Marchand—she had been telling the truth when she spoke of the initial pain, when she exalted over the excruciating moonlit pleasure._

_He would bed us both, the three boys had decided months before, and finish his school years a legend._

_Sophie had been easy for him to fuck and forget. He touched my cheek and rubbed the blistering skin with the pad of his thumb. Smooth, gentle circles that made my eyelids flutter even as that unWaldorf emotion coiled tight around my spine and set the pace of my heart thundering along with the clip of a hummingbird's wings._

"_You were the one I wanted to cage."_

_His words reverberated in the sharp green glimmer of his unblinking eyes, cut deep across my chest and dug into the crevices of my ears, the same time that he pressed his fingernail as firmly and as suddenly as a backhanded punch beneath my cheekbone, bruising and unforgiving, and tightening his four other fingers around the more giving flesh of my quivering neck._

"_A wounded bird..." his other hand pinned me against the wall and clenched around my wrists like iron shackles. His fathomless eyes bore into mine, rendering me incapable of looking anywhere but into their depths, hypnotized and weak and helpless. A mouse backed into the corner of a snake cage._

"_Is so beautiful when it's struggling to fly."_

I didn't sleep well that night, though not for lack of trying.

1 AM – I lit candles for aromatherapy and they did not soothe my nerves.

1:32 AM – I read fairytales to try and induce some kind of dreamlike mental state, and only found myself wondering if living with seven little dwarf men in the middle of the forest was really a wise move, and contemplating how incredibly uncomfortable a glass slipper must actually be to walk in.

2:27 am – I switched to textbooks to try and bore myself to sleep, but actually became interested in the American Revolution when a French general named Marquis de Lafayette was mentioned as becoming involved in 1777.

3:54 AM - When history failed me, I counted sheep, did jumping jacks, meditated, practiced relaxing individual parts of my body, played every soothing song in my music library, watched a bit of television, surfed the internet and re-read most of Gossip Girl's archives while I was at it, updated all of my social networking sites for the first time in months, browsed through old pictures, organized my shoes, and completed my worthless French homework.

6:00 AM, the alarm clock taunted.

I unplugged it and turned on the lights—it was no use pretending anymore. I decided that, while I was officially awake and pottering around, I ought to look through Aunt Jenny's pattern book so she could finish my cotillion dress in time for the ball. Something off the rack, I had already informed her, would be entirely improper—what if someone else arrived in the same gown?

So, after tiptoeing silently past Lux's slightly ajar bedroom door and managing not to wake Lex when my foot caught on the rug and sent me tumbling to the ground, I quietly crept down the stairs and set my course for the kitchen to brew the morning pot of coffee. It was Saturday, and it was extremely early, so I naturally assumed I was the only member of the house up and about and starting breakfast.

As I dug through the cupboards for fresh fruit and orange juice, I happened to see the light on in Jenny's work studio and wondered if she had stayed up all night working on her jewelry designs.

Thinking it would be nice to make up for all the cold shouldering I had given her since Thanksgiving, I pulled a blanket out of the hall closet and unfolded so I could drape it over her sleeping form and leave her undisturbed. But when I got to the door and paused at the handle, I heard her voice—and it was soon joined by another, deeper and more masculine and _definitely _angry.

"...we're even pretending anymore. It's not fair to anyone, especially not the kids."

There was a pause, and then I heard Jenny's chair creak as though being sunk into. "Do you think they know?"

"They're not stupid, Jen." Nate exhaled, and I could imagine his hands raking through that thinning hair.

"I didn't say they were stupid!" she snapped exasperatedly, and the chair creaked again. "They might not know it's come to this."

I pressed my ear to the door so that all of my weight depended on it, and hoped desperately neither one of them planned to make some kind of dramatic exit. I had plummeted to the floor one too many times that morning, and I didn't need a repeat performance with an avid and surprised audience.

"It won't be a shock," Nate was saying. The sound of his feet on the floor let me know he was pacing back and forth, probably while ripping his hair out and avoiding Aunt Jenny's eyes like the very Plague would spring out at him from their pits. "They can't _not _see it coming—it's not like things have been getting any better. We don't even sleep in the same room anymore."

"I know, but this kind of thing is never _expected._"

"If they think we're going to work this out," the pacing stopped. "Then they're dreaming."

"There's nothing left to work out," I heard Jenny agree, and her footsteps led her to what I thought was her back window.

A _fwoosh_ sound meant Nate had dropped onto the plush couch that sat along her wall. "Lex is graduating soon; it won't be as hard for him."

"Lux will never forgive me," Jenny whispered, so quietly I barely heard her.

"It's me she'll never forgive," Nate's voice was heavy and low and I imagined it was his head dangling hopelessly between his shoulders that gave it that hollow, vacant tenor. "I'm moving out and going to another country..."

"Yes." The whisper evaporated and was replaced with a cutting snarl. "How _is _Blair doing all by herself in that big house?"

I actually dropped the blanket to the floor and crouched down to see if the crack under the door might provide higher volume.

"You know it's not like that." His teeth were clenched, judging by the harshness of his mumble. "I love Blair—"

"Oh, trust me, I know."

Did Jenny really think that my godfather and ma _mère_ were—that they—together—in my own house—while I was there—did she really think—no, it was entirely implausible. And, if I still lived in the fantasy world wherein Blair Waldorf _was _ma mère (I kept forgetting not to call her that...it was starting to be a really annoying unbreakable habit that I wanted to have someone hotwire out of my brain, or however you removed things from other things...), I would be incredibly offended for her integrity.

As if she would dally with a married man!

Um...as far as I had concrete proof of, anyway. There was still the whole 'Chuck Bass-only married once-how do you explain the wedding photo in her old bedroom-Teddy will kill me if I bring up that subject again and I'll never get anymore dirt from him' situation to contend with.

But she would _not_ dawdle with Nate Archibald! For one, they were incredibly close _friends_; for two, they acted more like bickering siblings than former lovers, and I _knew_ their history thanks to the internet and posterity; for three, well, ew! Adults weren't meant to have _sex lives_, or at least not meant to talk about them in front of people of a certain tender, youthful and blissfully naïve persuasion—wasn't there an age limit? 'Must Be This Young to Ride'?

"You only go and visit her _four times a year_. Five times a year, if you count the _one time_ we all go with you."

"She's one of my best friends," Nate defended. "And she has it rough."

Jenny scoffed. "She could have ended this years ago with a phone call. Or she could have just _shown up_ when he was in town."

"She isn't going to do that until she's _ready_."

"She should _get _ready! Not a lot of people get a real chance a true love, Nate! We should know that better than anyone!"

Nate didn't respond immediately, but when he did it was with a tight growl. "What does that mean?"

"Oh please," she sat again, because I heard the wheels of her chair roll on the floor as she pushed it into place behind her work desk. "Do you think all of this would be happening if we were in 'true love'? Whatever sad, juvenile feelings we had for each other died the day I told you I was pregnant with Lux, and you know it."

Nate's footsteps took him closer to her, away from the door. "Don't you dare blame this on our daughter."

"I'm not blaming it on her!" I heard Jenny's fist hit the desk. "I _love_ her. And so do you. But we don't love each other."

"We're just not..." Nate sighed again, and this time I heard him traveling to the door.

"Who we used to be." The sound of Jenny's computer booting up served as her background music. "Who is?"

Before my godfather could come storming through the door and stomp his way down the hallway, through the kitchen and living room to his private den, I dashed back to the kitchen and pretended to be singing along with the radio and even rinsed out my not-even-remotely-dirty breakfast dishes in the sink. Again, I heard Nate's footsteps nearby, but as I hummed louder to erase any notions that I might have been eavesdropping on their very adult and private conversation, he came to a stop behind me and put the blanket I had dropped around my shoulders.

"It's cold today, put on something warmer," he instructed vaguely.

And then he was gone, hidden away in the cozy darkness of his personal retreat before I could answer.

I didn't know what to think about what I had overheard—I didn't even _want_ to think about it, or the ramifications it would have on my life and the lives of people that I loved and cherished and cared about as much as I thought a person must care about real, blood family. But the words would not stop replaying themselves in my mind, the exhausted accusations and the tired routine of their words. Bent and distorted beneath life's trials and circumstances, they were no longer the sunny couple I remembered from my childhood—the beautiful prince and princess with gifts and smiles and hugs and cake and the best playthings (Lex and Lux) for me to entertain myself with.

_We're just not..._

_Who we used to be. Who is?_

Who indeed.

I didn't mention what I had overheard to anyone, and soldiered nervously through the entire weekend. I fervently hoped Nate had not realized the significance of that blanket; I pretended that he and Aunt Jenny were merely having a drastic discussion over some minor tiff that had set them off. Everything would be fine between them—after all, he was the perfect white prince every little girl dreamed of marrying, and she was the beautiful and successful pauper seamstress he had fallen for and married despite all convention or pretension.

They were perfect for each other.

Weren't they?

Lux was golden and magnetic, spending hours chatting with her mother, crossing the street for long afternoon walks in Central Park, and humoring me by joining bedroom screenings of my favorite European films. I knew that she wasn't entirely oblivious to the situation, but I could tell by the way she went back and forth between her parents wearing a never-ending pearly white smile, that she was clinging to a few dangling threads of hope.

Lex, on the other hand, was a dark shadow in the corners. He avoided the brilliantly lit windows and the radiant openness of the fully stocked kitchen, opting instead to meet friends in darkly lit cafés and go entire nights without calling Nate or Jenny or anyone to tell them where he was. I wondered if he smoked pot to escape the reality of his parents' crumbling relationship, or if he did it to look cool in front of his friends, or even to inspire some kind of artistic creativity I had never known he possessed; but I mostly figured he did it out of some long ingrained habit. Perhaps he had taken a hit at a party once, two hits at a party after that, and had merely continued doing it because it was something he could not possibly fail at.

He had graciously if not unenthusiastically agreed to be my distinguished escort to the cotillion, so I pedaled alongside him and his sister the following brusque Monday morning, December 6th, and engaged them in filler chatter to pass the time as we weaved in and out of hordes of our fellow sidewalk pedestrians. The sky was brighter and clearer and bluer than it had been my entire stay, so I relished in the glow the sun's rays spread across my milky pale, sunshine-starved skin. It unfortunately had no bearing on the harsh, blistering cold, so my meticulously planned outfit was forced to hide underneath a brand new deep red velvet spread collar coat, with a double-breasted button front and incredibly flattering peaked shoulders.

To draw more attention to the coat, I had pulled my hair into a low, pretty bun and played up my eyes with smoky eyeshadow and dark liner. Lux had, adorably, asked me who I was trying to impress. Of course, I was out to impress no one—dressing better than Saffron My-attempts-at-mixing-and-matching-make-me-look-like-I-moonlight-as-Toodles-the-Clown-at-children's-parties Kennedy wasn't exactly a precise obscure off-shot branch of advanced rocket science, and I had put any and all unhealthy interest in any and all tall/dark-haired/infuriating/motorcycle-riding boys aside for good.

I merely wanted to do the coat justice.

As I wondered about what poor, hackneyed rip-off of my ensemble the 'Queen Bee' would be wearing that day, it occurred to me that I had been nowhere near as thorough in investigating her as I had been drawing up and executing the plans of **Operation: Top Gun**. If I wanted to knock her off her undeserved pedestal and rip the tiara right out of her dry and over-processed, shoddily highlighted locks, it would take a lot more than just snappy comebacks and sheer ingenuity.

"Tell me all about Saffron." I interrupted something Lux had been saying about an eventful-sounding dream of pirates going toe-to-toe with a gang of toddlers who stole weaker children's big wheels and kept them for their own evil pre-school deeds. "Strengths, weaknesses. Like, if I hold a crucifix in her face or douse her nasty split ends with holy water, will she melt _a la_ the wicked witch of the west? Ooh, we could drop a house on her..."

"Are you implying that she's a vampire and you want to stake her or that she's a witch and you want to burn her?" Lines sprang across Lex's forehead as he inquiringly arched his eyebrows and smiled a little too asymmetrically. "They're two incredibly different things."

I shrugged off this minor detail and carefully steered around a sophisticated elderly woman in a faux fur coat and the yapping Bichon Frisé bouncing at her feet. "Mixed metaphors are highly underrated."

"Well..." Lux scratched her scalp so her flaxen roots stuck up like peacock feathers. "She doesn't like you."

"Merci," I rolled my eyes, steering one-handed so I could reach over and flatten her curls. "We _have_ to work on your stating of the obvious."

"She thinks you're trying to steal Maverick away from her?" she offered. "And she's planning to embarrass you somehow."

"When?" I demanded, already mentally going through my catalogue of revenge tactics and planning various methods with which to take my vengeance.

Lux blushed pink and let her bangs fall over her eyes. "I'm sworn to secrecy..."

"Quoi? 'Secrecy'?" I blinked in disbelief. "You _know _what she is going to do to me, and you are _keeping it_ from me?"

"That's such a...that's such a harsh way to put it." She bit her pouting cherry red lip and shouldered her bag uncomfortably. "I prefer the term 'opting not to tell you in order to save my social life from being entirely ruined and preventing myself from having to walk down the hall without being severely hazed by my friends until I drop out or they graduate, whichever comes first'. It's not that I _want_ you to get icky yogurt all in your hair, but—"

A gasp from her own throat silenced her, and I touched my hair protectively. _Yogurt_? How passé. Good thing I had acted on an impulse, and grabbed a head scarf in case of the unforeseeable but all too real possibility of unexpected covert ops... Of course, it was my favorite vintage Hermès silk twill hand-rolled scarf, and not even if I mailed it express to Dorota in France would it return in pristine condition after a yogurt catapult. Alas, the scarf was lost.

It would die valiantly, and I would wave it victoriously at her and wink cheerfully at her asthmatic minions when they keeled over with shock. _Cassandra,_ they would call me. _Soothsayer! Sibyl! Prophet!_ _Clairvoyant! _And for those with limited vocabulary and no knowledge of what those names had to do with Madam Cleo and her 1-800 number: _Fortune-teller! Psychic! Do you know Madam Cleo?! OMG, will you read my palm?_ They would swarm me and demand to know from whom I had inherited my divining powers.

"_An oracle does not reveal her secrets to lesser mortals_," I would pompously reply.

They wouldn't just make me their _queen_; if I played my cards right, they would refer to me as their _goddess_.

"Merci beaucoup, mon ange." I puckered my lips at her and ignored her look of pallid despair. "Sauveur et mon ami doux, doux!"

"I don't _speak_ French..." I heard her grumble.

Lex was kind enough to stub out his morning cigarette, the smoking of which became more and more routine with every passing sunrise, and enlightened me with all of the information he had on Constance's own self-described _fashionista and party hosting maharishi_. As good as everyone undoubtedly agreed she was, I knew they didn't know better—after all, the day Saffron I-think-I-fool-people-by-telling-them-this-cheap-Canal-Street-knock-off-was-a-one-of-a-kind-birthday-gift-from-Domenico Dolce-and-Stefano-Gabbana Kennedy was capable of throwing an opulent-yet-still-classy soiree that could even stand in the _shadows_ of Blair Waldorf's exclusive and immaculately catered affairs, I would actually go to school in my long-discarded nutmeg-colored Burberry calamity.

I also wanted her to spell the word _maharishi_. Out loud.

He told me she was the step-sister of Scarlett Rose (which I had already heard from the temporarily reigning queen herself, but it was nice to hear confirmation from a reliable, albeit still a little stoned source), that they had a little sister named Violet—one of the girls Lux studied with in the library, and that their parents were globe-trotters who sent monthly postcards to the East Village apartment and occasionally returned for special occasions (Arbor Day, Earth Day, National Recreational Scuba Diving Week, St. Patrick's Day, and Pepper Pot Day, most frequently). Saffron never saw those postcards, however, because she squandered most of her monthly allowance on a hotel room at the Palace Hotel on Madison Avenue, and hardly ever had any civil contact with her siblings.

She had once pursued a serious relationship with Lex, but he had refused her, citing an extreme disinterest in her 'baby prostitute' voice.

According to Lux, who finally pried her lips apart and contributed as the school came into view, she was the lead deb at Lily van der Woodsen's prestigious cotillion and debutante ball, chose her minions based on their low grade point averages, and spent most of her Saturday nights getting hilariously drunk at various exclusive clubs, and threatening anyone nearby with social ruination if they so much as snapped one unflattering grainy cell phone picture.

I asked what _her_ grade point average was, and Lux went mysteriously silent again.

Cedric snapped a few candid shots of me parking my bicycle when I went around to the back entrance.

"What are you doing here?" I wondered, since only a smattering of bookworms littered the back courtyard's benches with their mountains of schoolbooks and irritable twitching mouths every time _anyone's _stiletto heel clicked against the pavement.

"Trying to capture the essence of learning." He snapped a picture of my hands securing the bicycle's lock, then another of my face when I stared patiently at his reflective lens and waited for the inspiration to pass.

He followed me when I finally gave up and started for the double bullnose staircase. "What are you doing _now_? Stalking me?"

"You're my muse today." I heard more snapping noises behind me and whirled around to make sure he wasn't shooting up my skirt.

He merely looked at me through the viewfinder, undoubtedly waiting for me to do something "natural".

"I'm not even learning anything," I informed him, crossing my arms impatiently and pursing my lips. "Except how annoying you are."

"You're annoying too." He mashed his finger down and captured my perfectly insulted scowl. "But very photogenic."

"Merci beaucoup," I deadpanned. "Je sais."

He followed me up the stairs and into the girls' hallway, where that incessant camera of his flashed and clicked and zoomed and focused all around me, and I seriously contemplated shoving my palm in his face to block any future shots from popping up in one non-stop slideshow on his digital display.

"Do you ever put that thing _down_?"

"Nope," he looked like he was about to shake his head, but realized it might compromise a potentially perfect photograph from being born and stopped himself just in the nick of time. "Never. Not since I was nine. I record stuff too, make amateur movies, put a few of my pieces up in a few of the galleries in Brooklyn..."

_Snap!_

"My grandpa used to own a gallery on Bedford Street, so I have him look at my stuff before I submit it to anybody," _SNAP!_ "and he's going to help me put a portfolio together for college because I want to go somewhere with a good photography program, like Academy of Art in San Francisco," _SNAP!_ "or Briarcliffe if I decide I want to stay a little closer to mom and dad,"_ SNAP!_ "even though it'll really just be dad since mom's been really blowing up in the indie film industry so she's basically all over the place."

_SNAP! SNAP! SNAP!_

_Snap!_

"Okay!" I covered my face with my purse and spoke from behind it. "I can see why Lux finds this so irritating. Leave me alone."

"But we haven't even been out to the front courtyard!" _SNAP!_ "The light is great this morning, and I was gonna ask if—"

"Non." I peered around my bag and glared when I saw his pointer finger tremble. "No 'day in the life of Elle Waldorf' for you. Shoo!"

I immediately attempted to ditch him when we emerged from the snug darkness of Constance and once again found ourselves bathed in the dynamically yellow winter light, but not even the usual crush of people allowed me an easy escape route. He followed me _across_ the quad, through five huddles of girls (all of whom turned to each other excitedly and whispered urgently at my passing) and four large groups of sporty males, around unobservant people trying to walk and text at the same time and people too immersed in their mobile phone conversations to even think about moving one inch, and past The Girls of the Front Steps (as Lux had informed me they were known as).

When I finally reached Lux and started to ask where Lex had vanished to, the snapping started again.

"Cedric!" Lux released a strangled groan and did the very thing I had considered in the hallway.

Close-ups of her rosy pink palm were clearly not what he needed in his repertoire, so he sighed in agonized inconvenience and walked away.

"I swear to God, I'm going to break his camera one of these days. It's like he's studying to be a paparazzi or something."

"_Paparazzo_," I promptly corrected, checking my hair in my compact mirror.

Lux turned her head so she could look at me with those puzzled eyes. "Huh?"

"_Paparazzo_," I said again, in a faintly Venetian accent gleaned from so many summers spent in Italy. "It's the singular form of _paparazzi_."

"You and your European languages." Lux waved her hands indifferently and adjusted her bag again. "Well, I have to go see if Saffron wants any coffee or tea before class, so I'll catch up with you after school?"

I had been told, rather gravely the evening before as the credits for _La vie en rose_ scrolled across the television screen, that she could no longer hang around with me during lunch. Saffron was apparently—direct quote—"antsy" that she return to her post on the school's front steps and—paraphrase because the direct quote was too ridiculous to even pretend to take seriously—"uphold the position you promised to take on when I painstakingly selected you from a competitive list of suitable candidates".

Apparently, this position involved catering to Saffron's breakfast, lunch, and dinner whims, doing her homework when she was too 'busy' to do it herself, and ensuring that no one attempted to stir mutiny within the school's ivy-draped walls. I was still allowed to live in the Archibald house, according to Lux's sovereign, but the two of us could not have any contact outside of that, and if she noticed my 'rebellious influence' rubbing off on my god sister, she would 'ruin' her 'forever'.

_Dieu_, I couldn't wait to wipe that smug sense of undeserved entitlement off her plastic robotic doll face.

I realized later that day, with a stone of dread dropping to the pit of my stomach, that the quickest and _easiest_ way to do that was through the very person I needed to avoid at all costs. The way she fawned and fluttered her false eyelashes up at him before classes, the little girlish squeal in her voice when I heard her whisper in the back of the room to her mindless cronies about his finer physical attributes (all of which I was reluctant to soundlessly admit I agreed with her about), her somewhat creepy and extremely adolescent joke about starting a Maverick Sparks Fan Club of which she could be the president...

All of it made what I had to do abundantly clear.

I could mock her clothes all day, but no one else seemed to mind them as much as I did. I could sabotage her with a series of highly embarrassing pranks, but that would only cause her to retaliate and I would undoubtedly find myself engaged in some kind of infantile practical joke _war_, and that idea was so incredibly beneath me I couldn't even fathom how deep within the earth it resided. I could expose the low grade point average I strongly suspected she had, but who would care as long as she kept throwing her 'killer' parties and maintaining a certain standard of popularity within her ranks?

What I had to do was what I had intended to do to her sister, at the outset of **Operation: Top Gun**. I had to do the very thing she feared I would do and literally _steal_ Maverick from her stubby clutches.

At lunch, I watched her detain him at the front steps and seethed as she ran her shiny claws down his striped tie to rest pointedly on the buckle of his nondescript brown leather belt. She tossed her hair and shot him a garishly obvious set of bedroom eyes, and I saw him smirk and saw her giggle and saw him run his hands through his hair and casually flick his head so it fell just so over his ears and saw how close she was getting to him.

One time early in my childhood, during one of the Archibalds' yearly visits to France, Lux had invaded my prized cupboard of priceless porcelain dolls and decreased their value by traipsing them around the room and playing 'protest march' with them—chipping two of their noses, three of their hands, ripping seven of their dresses in various places, and breaking exactly two of them in the process. Or, 'in the protest', as she had stubbornly defended.

And I had forbidden her to _ever_ touch any of my things again. My things were _my_ things for a reason, and I didn't take kindly to anyone getting their greasy, grubby, greedy fingerprints all over their irreplaceable never-been-touched-not-even-by-me delicate lily-white china. A little girl in the schoolyard had learned that lesson when she stole my bouncy ball one hot afternoon during recess, and I had immediately thrown a much larger, much bouncier chequered football in her sweaty piggy face and taken _my_ bouncy ball back.

Saffron slid her hand up his torso to his shoulder and let it lay there as she surely suggested, once again, that he escort her to the ball.

As I always did when some schoolgirl in tacky shoes wearing knock-off earrings _touched_ something of mine, I snapped and crossed the forty some odd paces from the imposing double doors to the top of the cluttered front steps, and interrupted their charming little tête-à-tête with a dainty _ahem_ and an amiable smile.

"Bonjour, Maverick."

Saffron scoffed and started to step towards me, but all at once Maverick turned his body away from her and his arrogant smirk twitched into more of an interested half-smirk half-smile. _A smirkile_, I decided dreamily, letting the spell of those enticing upturned lips sweep over my body and infect my every pore with giddiness.

"Princess," he greeted rakishly, using the mocking nickname that sounded simultaneously insulting and complimentary, and he didn't even need to run his fingers through his hair to make me want to move closer. "Something you want?"

"Well-worded," I parried, denying him the more coquettish response of a breathy _you._ "I was wondering if you considered my offer yet."

Once again, Saffron made a noise of displeasure and crossed her tense arms over stiff poly-blend, but Maverick moved before she could.

"You made me an offer?"

I nodded unflappably, slowly figuring out his game and learning how to play it through much trial and error. "I asked you to escort me to the debutante ball last Friday during our free block, just before lunch. You asked me why I thought you should escort me, and when I told you to 'look at me', you gave me a very quick once over and left without answering. I assumed you retreated to consider my offer, and just wanted to know if you've taken a long enough look and decided you like what you see."

Unlike Saffron, I didn't touch him, didn't giggle or wink or saunter closer, just maintained a steady unwavering eye contact I had learned on another Monday morning in a very different setting with entirely too _much _touching, and waited for his full, perfectly proportioned and positioned and plump lips to part and give me my answer. Because I wouldn't accept another one of his noncommittal winks and mysterious departures as an answer even one more time.

Saffron latched onto his arm like a leech, practically sinking her talons into his bicep.

Maverick reached into his pocket for a cigarette and offered me one, which I declined as I had every cigarette before it, and would every cigarette after it. He lit it between his teeth with his monogrammed silver Zippo lighter, sucked in a deep and soothing breath, then released a fair amount of swirling smoke right in the face of his parasite, who choked and sputtered and released him from her grip almost instantaneously.

_That_ I had to grin at.

"I definitely like what I see." He flicked the glowing ashes off the tip and stared rather hard at my face. "What day is it?"

I frowned a little, wondering why he needed that day's date, and said, "December 6th?"

Then, he laughed a little courteously—as courteously as he could manage, I guessed—and moved one step closer. "Cotillion."

"Oh," I mentally berated myself for blowing my cool demeanor at such a simple inquiry, but reigned it in long enough to answer. "The 18th."

There was stillness then, as the wind settled around our shoulders and stopped bristling fabric and curls, and Saffron narrowed her eyes into the straightest slits I had ever seen as Maverick nodded and took another slow drag from his Camel. "The 18th it is then, princess."

Sooner than even I, in all my devious plotting and detailed scheming and planning, had anticipated, I had wiped the smug sense of undeserved entitlement off Saffron I-have-never-been-so-repeatedly-shot-down-and-still-made-a-public-fool-of-myself-chasing-a-man-who-doesn't-want-anything-to-do-with-me-despite-his-obvious-disinterest-that-I-pretended-was-him-playing-hard-to-get Kennedy's plastic robotic doll face.

The endorphins flooded my bloodstream as they usually did when I caused public humiliation to people who _enormously_ and undeniably deserved it, and carried me down the front steps, through her gauntlet of gaping servants, past Lux where she sat as a provisional émigré at the bottom step, and down the street to find Lex at the Met and inform him that he wouldn't have to slog through the cotililion evening on my arm because I had _accomplished _my immense mission not fifteen minutes after resolving to see it through!

I found the fresh blueness of the sky _très approprié_.

I pondered doubling back for my bicycle, just so I could fully enjoy the crisp breeze and perhaps go somewhere uncharted for my lunch, but when I rounded the corner to go around to the back of the school and quickly grab it, I almost stumbled over two très connected, très amorous, _très_ blond male people locked in an intensely personal embrace.

"Ah!" I squeaked in a preposterously unladylike fashion. The two men sprang apart in shock. "Sacre bleu! Mon Dieu! Je suis désolé!"

My hand flew to my heart as I caught the breath I had sucked in due to that pesky instinctive fight or flight syndrome.

Numerous words of apology slammed on the breaks and crashed into the back of my teeth when I realized who I had interrupted, whose disarrayed hair was whipping in the wind, whose eyes were wide with shock and staring at me with the same level of _'oh, shit'_ behind them I was sure mine were broadcasting in big, flashing, neon lights.

"Lex?!"

Then, my gaze shifted to the tall man beside him and I choked on another cry of _'Mon dieu!'_

"Julian!?"


	28. Les Misérables

**A/N: **Yes, Julian, Elle does seem to have acquired a very dirty mouth. Wonder what bad influence she got that habit from? Enjoy this—I tried to achieve a balance between happiness and utter despair, and if it worked well, please drop a line and let me know what you thought. I've never gone from one extreme giddy emotion to one tremendously horrendous emotion so quickly except in real life and on stage, but never in writing. I hope I've portrayed it appropriately through the written word...

Also, a very tiny dangling loose end from chapter ten is tied up in this chapter. =] Hooray!

I've put the links to my archive, livejournal, and twitter on my profile, so join/add me if you want. My archive is more for storing my fics, socializing within the fanfiction community (so join to just talk on the disccusion board!) and linking each other to great fics. My livejournal is where I'll be writing about the process of writing each chapter, so you can know how things are coming along, so add me as a friend and get in on the creativity. My twitter is my twitter, and it's filled with more real life things than fanfiction things, but every now and then I post on the status of chapters. Add me, but make sure to message me and let me know you're from here or I'll probably ignore and block you.

DISCLAIMER: Quote from _Les Misérables_ by Victor Hugo are used and referenced in the chapter. They're fairly obvious.

xoxo

"_A lugubrious being was Montparnasse. Montparnasse was a child; less than twenty years of age, with a handsome face, lips like cherries, charming black hair, the brilliant light of springtime in his eyes; he had all vices and aspired to all crimes._"  
-- Victor Hugo

**CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT**  
_Les Misérables_

Lex. Julian. Lex. Julian.

My eyes darted back and forth between them, trying desperately to gather information to feed to my racing brain, which was on overdrive trying to decipher the scene I had inadvertently witnessed and could never erase from the suddenly floating infrared spectrum in front of my retinas. I was going to go blind, I just knew it – people went blind sometimes because of overstress or witnessing something so beyond the human brain's capability to process without shutting down one of the senses, or something like that, I had read it on an addicting medical site online the year before. I would go blind and all I would be able to see...would be the two of them kissing, locked in a passionate lip lock, hands grasping at each other's shoulders and messing up each other's hair...

Lex! Alexander William Archibald, son of the dashing Nathaniel Fitzwilliam Archibald and fashion mogul Jennifer Archibald aka Jenny Humphrey aka Little J, prince of the Upper East Side and renowned football aficionado! Lacrosse team captain, all-around American boy, apple pie and baseball and whatever that meant! He was handsome and rich and eligible and loved yachting like his dad and wasn't adverse to sitting in the front row at a fashion show if his mother wanted him there and—

Dieu, no wonder he wasn't 'adverse' to it! He had just been pretending to have low maintenance style all those years; he was secretly _attracted _to the bright patterns and over-the-top hair and makeup.

It all clicked very precisely into place. _No wonder_ he liked football so much!

Lex!

And Julian! Julian Ashcroft-Van der Woodsen, who had been my _boyfriend when I was seven and he was ten_. How could I not have known?! How could I not have read the signs before? All that talk about 'just because my dads are gay doesn't mean I'll automatically turn out to be gay' and 'I'm not being _conditioned _to be gay here—they are fine with whatever orientation I choose, and I'm just not gay...it's just not who I am.'

LIES.

Lying mouth full of liar lies! I was rather a connoisseur on that particular trait.

I eventually settled for staring at them, one at a time, letting my eyes adjust to the different expressions on their faces.

Jules was a sculpture, staring evenly back into my eyes with a perfectly shaped steely calm that quite honestly freaked me out more than a little bit. Why was he looking at me like that? _I _should have been looking at _him _like that; I should be trying to force a confession out of him—because I had been around them both my entire life, knew their likes and dislikes and knew what they were like and what their types were and how they liked to spend their days, and my gaydar had _never once_ gone off around either of them! Ever!

Not even at Thanksgiving, when they had been the same room with me for the first time I a long time, sitting beside each other and...

...Exchanging hushed conversation and meaningful glances!

_Merde! Putain! ...**Putain de merde!**_

I voiced that aloud and Julian, who had taken French all four years of high school and was still taking it in college, cracked the perfectly poised veneer he had been reinforcing ever since I had discovered them, and chuckled affectionately. "You have a very dirty mouth, Ellie. When did that happen?"

"I don't—what—you—" I stared, bug-eyed at Julian's lying mouth, then blinked at Lex's. "And _YOU_?" Lex tightened his lips to prevent a smile. How could they be thinking about smiling in this life altering situation? I had just discovered them cleaning out each other's throats with their tongues, and I would likely never recover without extensive therapy. They were my _friends_. How had they hidden this from me? My gaydar was broken!!!!! I felt like crying, but decided to mourn the lost talent at another, more _alone _time. "When?! _Where?!_ _**How?!**_"

Julian opened his mouth and I sensed the smartass comment on the winter wind and shot him a glare.

"Forget that last part. And also the second part!" Lex also attempted to speak. "And be very vague with the first part!"

My conditions settled in, and Julian crossed his arms neutrally over his chest. "Can I talk now?"

"Oui, oui..."

I was too busy pinching the bridge of my nose to prevent a migraine to nod, and quickly forgot that I had granted this auspicious permission and continued my stunned rant as I wandered in aimless circles in front of them.

"C'est le foutu borde... I walk around the corner and it's your own little public _baisodrome _where anyone could just stumble upon you and need intensive psychiatric help... Je regrette, mais... Excusez-moi, s'il te plait. Je veux alcool, maintenant."

Lex and Julian each looped one of their arms through both of mine and steered me away from the school. "That, we can do."

"Neither of you are of age," I mumbled incoherently, not even sure if it mattered.

Obviously, it didn't. We walked into a bar and Jules ordered a perplexing blue margarita for himself and an even more random frozen grasshopper for Lex. Before he could order me a berry smoothie or something equally not-my-style, I interceded and had the bartender make me a gin martini, extra vermouth, no olive garnish, "and please just have another one ready for when I'm done with this one."

Lex and Julian sat beside each other in a corner booth and sipped their girly drinks, as I wondered what the hell was going on.

"Are you two just trying to be extra gay to throw me for an even _bigger _loop?"

Lex's mouth twitched as he stirred his straw in his drink and let it sit. "The hard liquor is for the evenings, Ells."

"I need it now," I defended, taking my martini the second it was handed to me and gulping down half of it in one go.

"Is it really that offensive?" Julian carelessly threw his arm over the back of their seat and leaned unceremoniously towards Lex, the better to further cement the image of them as a _couple _in my mind's eye—it was like pouring salt in my freshly opened wounds. "Don't you have two gay granddads?"

I set down my glass and stared, once again, at them both. "I'm not offended. I'm _shocked _and my gaydar is broken!"

That set them both laughing, full-tilt and before long, tears leaked from between their eyes as they clutched their stomachs and used each other's weight to keep from falling out of the booth and into a rolling mess of designer clothes on the bar's floor. Watching them triggered something in the front of my stomach and a few giggles bubbled up through my throat and into the air, feather light at first, but stronger and less like giggles the longer I pressed my palms to the tabletop and struggled to catch my breath.

Lex reached over and shook my shoulder gently. "It's probably not broken. I'm recently gay, so it's probably not done..." He choked on his next words and sent Julian into a fresh laughing fit as he tried to force them out. "Not done...up-updating!"

I clamped both hands over my mouth to push down the peals of mirth threatening to erupt around us. The patrons at a nearby booth looked at this disapprovingly—one sip and already wasted, they probably thought. I didn't care. My body was shaking, and my abdominals ached from the constant pressure behind them, and I accidentally banged my funny bone on the edge of the table as I leaned forward on a particularly uncontainable chortle, and Julian and Lex were right there with me. Our faces were jointly tear-streaked and beet red, our throats raw and dry from so much polite repression.

When the laughs turned into hiccups and we were able to look each other in the eye again, I shook my head apologetically and twirled my martini glass by the stem. "Oh, Dieu...I am so sorry I, um..." I searched for the word en Anglais that would sum up my reaction to their curbside make out session, but the only thing that came to mind was _putain de merde_ again, and that was hardly appropriate to yell out in a bar in the middle of the day. "Comment dites-toi?"

"Freaked out?" Lex suggested.

"Had a total Waldorf meltdown?" Julian proposed.

"Completely overreacted and almost caused a scene right in front of the school?" Lex added.

"Probably need to take some kind of class to learn to sort through your weird emotions?" Julian recommended.

"Don't have a working gaydar." Lex snickered, still highly amused.

"I just never imagined..." I admitted. "Not in a million years. Not you two, and definitely not together! I wish I had found out like, sitting on your couch and watching you pace back and forth as you thought of the best way to phrase it, while I wondered if you were about to let everyone know you were into hard drugs or dying from an incurable tropical disease, only to find out, nope! Yay! Gay! But now..." The image returned to my poor, damaged brain. "Tongues, gah..."

I polished off the last of my martini and gratefully took the one that followed.

"Just not a fan of seeing your friends make out?" Lex at least sounded sympathetic.

"_So _not a fan."

I collected myself and took a few deep, calming breaths to center my thoughts. Then, I examined them both with a more objective eye and saw that their body language really did indicate a very close relationship; not _necessarily _strictly physical, but there was definitely a magnetic attraction between the two. But the way Lex was perfectly at ease beside Julian, contained none of the frenetic energy I knew him to have as he waited in corners for the next moment he could escape... it made me very happy they had each other—because clearly, it was so very, very right.

The smile on my face must have told them what I saw, because Jules winked and Lex shrugged as if to say, 'I know, right?'

"Who else knows?" I speculated, eager to talk about this exciting development with _everyone I had ever met_. I wanted to throw a party!

"No one," Lex answered immediately, rubbing his neck uneasily.

Julian cleared his throat, and Lex shot him a look.

"What?" I needed to know, and their secret eye code was not helpful. "Who knows?"

Lex drained his fruity drink and rubbed his forehead. "Jules was over one night and..." He looked to his boyfriend for support.

"His mom walked in." Julian was blunt and unbothered, but Lex hit himself in the temple and groaned.

"She doesn't know how to _knock_."

My mouth formed an 'o' and I looked away for a brief moment before reaching across and touching his shoulder like he had touched mine. "I'm sure she's completely fine with it, or if she's not...then, well, she just needs time. I mean, if she accidentally came across anything half as...how do you say? _Involved_," I smiled tenderly and squeezed his arm, "as I did, then she definitely is going to have to adjust."

He nodded because he knew all of this, but I could tell there was more on his mind. I didn't ask, but after a while, he told.

"Dad saw us too."

Julian gestured to the bartender to bring another, much stronger round of drinks to the table.

During our lunch hour, we ate quaint little bar sandwiches and I got slightly buzzed from my strong martinis and the straight shot of Stoli I knocked back as Lex told me all about that horrendously long, embarrassing, dark night when his mother found him and Julian in a rather compromising state of undress in his bed.

The evening had started normally enough; The Archibalds had piled into the family town car and made the trip to TriBeCa so Lex and Lux could attend a ridiculously exclusive barcode-invitation-only birthday party for one of Constance Billard's starting senior field hockey players. Then, Jenny and Nate had gone to a restaurant back on the Upper East Side for a romantic night alone—Lex had expected the house to be entirely empty, and called up Julian to meet him at a nearby café, where they grabbed coffees and caught a cab back to the townhouse on 74th Street to enjoy some quality alone time.

What they hadn't counted on was how quickly Jenny and Nate's evening would deteriorate, and—thinking her children were out of the house having fun with their friends, and eager to do something to get her mind off the argument she'd had with her husband over dinner, Jenny stormed upstairs to do some therapeutic cleaning.

Lex's room was the first stop on her warpath.

Everything had exploded from that point, with Jenny having a much more exaggerated version of my classically mild Waldorf meltdown and unintentionally attracting Nate's attention downstairs. Before Julian and Lex could even pull their shirts on and try to look like they had just been hanging out playing video games, Nate appeared in the doorway, saw the state of things, and almost had a coronary.

"It's not that he has a problem with people being gay or anything like that. I mean, I remember him and mom always voting for gay marriage, and they even went to Colin and Eric's wedding when they decided to tie the knot," Lex told me, sliding his cup back and forth between his hands and avoiding eye contact with anything but his reflection in the shiny table. "It's just... He has a problem with _me _being gay."

I nodded, not in understanding, but in sympathy. For both of them. Nate had probably pictured his future full of a daughter-in-law and numerous fat grandkids to carry on the Archibald name when he was gone, but the revelation that his son was gay and unable to live the life he had dreamed up while holding his little newborn son... I had heard it described as a grieving process, and wondered if that was why Nate locked himself in his den every night after work and drank himself to sleep.

He was grieving.

But while he was going through a 'natural' and necessary process, Lex was suffering from a lack of love and support.

I grabbed the glass from between his palms and took his hands in mine. "You're my god brother and I love you to death."

He finally looked at me again, and I could tell he knew I was on his side from the little light in his eyes.

"Thanks, Elle."

"And you'll be happy, because you don't have to take me to cotillion now!" I beamed at the expression of elation on his face, and nodded enthusiastically before he could make a peep about _'oh but I really wanted to go, I was really looking forward to it'_ or whatever pile of shit he was prepared to fling at me. "I got Maverick Sparks to agree to escort me."

Julian and Lex shared another one of their silent eye conversations, leaving me in the dust.

"Oh great, _what now_?"

"Maverick Sparks?" Julian scratched the stubble on his chin and frowned. "Be careful."

"I don't _like _him," I clarified, frantically waving my hands over our empty shot glasses. "It's this thing with Saffron."

I explained my grand scheme to dethrone Constance Billard's defunct queen with a brilliant coup or coup d'état—I was fuzzy on the real difference, and the vodka and vermouth were starting to get to me—and watched their facial expressions change from cautiously doubtful, to guardedly interested, to openly supportive, to downright exultant.

"That's...that's actually pretty damn brilliant," Jules admitted, dropping some bills on the table and leading us out into the fresh midday air. "But what if it doesn't work? Do you have a Plan B, or are you just flying by the seat of your stylish and finely crafted incredibly expensive pants?"

This made no sense to me, because I was in fact wearing a very cute dark blue bubble skirt. "I'm not wearing pants?"

Lex put an arm around my shoulders and kissed the side of my head. "She's cute, can we keep her?"

The walk back to school was a little too jovial, but it allowed us to get all of our tipsy and ridiculous chatter out of the way before we set our designer shoes on school property and ran the risk of being found out and suspended for disorderly conduct—possibly even expelled for being intoxicated minors on a Monday. Julian left us at the corner, after sharing a brief kiss with Lex safe from anyone else's view, and my god brother and I continued the journey toward the base of the front steps. Teddy was standing there with his fists gritted into pulsing fists, looking a tiny little bit...exasperated, to put it lightly.

"There you are." He held up his cell phone and shook it a little. "Do you not answer your phone anymore?"

Lex mumbled something that sounded distinctly like_ 'oh, shit'_ under his breath. "Sorry, man, I forgot we were supposed to meet up."

"What the hell happened? You were supposed to, uh..." Teddy glanced at me and appeared to think fast. "Help me with English."

"I thought I was going to teach you how to talk to Scarlett without spilling shit all over her?"

I bit my lip and pretended to be deaf. It was clear Teddy had wanted to keep that particular aspect of his life a secret from everyone, especially me, though I couldn't say I wasn't proud of him for taking the initiative to work on his suaveness. It was one area in which he was genuinely, severely lacking and outright confounded—it was almost like asking a three year old to do a swan dive off the high board and tread water for an hour in the deep end without water wings.

"It was my fault," I slipped under Lex's arm and dusted off my velvet shoulders. "I distracted him."

Teddy looked incredibly displeased, and the angles of his face turned down and darkened the shadows beneath his sharp edges.

I laughed a little awkwardly, slung my bag over my arm and waggled my fingers at them. "I'll just go, then."

The bell that signaled the end of the lunch hour had not yet tolled, but I knew if I did not scurry up the stairs and fight my way to my locker before it did sound out across the courtyard, I would very likely be late to Government class and my teacher already hated me because I was French and she had some kind of deep-seeded issue with our Prime Minister—whom I had met on numerous occasions and had found to be quite congenial and quick-witted. However, much to my chagrin, she was all about the States being the best country in the world, with a political system every other nation should happily adopt and copy, and a poster above her whiteboard that read 'These Colors Don't Run!'

There was also something about my countrymen being ungrateful 'pansies', but I wasn't entirely clear on what _viola tricolor hortensis_ had to do with me or people who were in charge of France in 2003, and what, in fact, those people had to do with people in charge of France _right the_n. I mostly tuned her out and stuck to writing down the hard facts, which were very confusing in and of themselves, without her complicating things with faulty and pointless floral analogies.

I wanted to get a seat in the back, which meant I would need to hurry even faster across the quad to navigate the path to my locker—and where on earth was my _key_? As I alighted the imposing front steps, still beleaguered with tiny groups of two and three slurping down low-calorie soup and picking at pre-packaged fruit cups, I bent my head over my purse and tried to dig around my makeup bag and notebooks to grab the ribbon I had tied on the end of my locker key to prevent myself from, well, losing it in my purse.

Before my fingers even found it, something cold, dripping, and clotted landed on the crown of my head and seeped through my glossy chestnut curls to my desperately-in-need-of-a-massage scalp. I froze where I was, eyes still focused on the inner depths of the quilted pocket attached to my leather Marc Jacobs tote, where I could see the slick and shiny red ribbon tied through the diamond shaped opening of my polished brass key.

A gasp came from nearby, and it was followed by another gasp, then a giggle, then a downright laugh. Pretty soon, everyone gathered around the stairs was staring, laughing, gasping, pointing, or snapping pictures for their private mobile phone collections. I straightened up and quickly clicked shut my bag's turn-lock closure and hugged it to my chest to protect the subtle frosting of silver Swarovski crystals on its pouch, a little wary of whoever had thrown the first gob seizing the opportunity to fling yogurt on my upturned face.

Above me, Saffron leaned against the balustrade, her spoon turned down in direct opposition to the self-satisfied upward bend of her lips.

I let out a jagged breath, aggravated more at the inconvenience than embarrassed by the silly prank. I would _definitely _be late to Government class and I would very likely end up with community service or hellish detention of some sort for my trouble; on the bright side, at least my pretty Hermès scarf had escaped unscathed. The hair, I could fix with a little thinking-on-my-toes and a lot of hair care-products-in-my-makeup-bag; the indignity I could endure because I had suffered through it and a lot more before and somehow survived; and Lux's apologetic face as I continued up the stairs and walked right past her...that I could forgive, because she hadn't come into her own yet, and what was she supposed to do against the only regime she had ever known?

I had once been fourteen and impressionable. I understood.

Then again, the walk to the front doors would have been infinitely easier with a friend at my side; it would have been a lot less difficult to keep my chin aloft and my shoulders squared and by back gracefully straight, if someone had been alongside with a comforting hand and a glare for anyone who dared snicker in my face.

When I at long last reached the front double doors, someone pushed themselves from a leaning position against the brick wall and leaned forward to hold the right one open for me.

"Thank you," I said, barely glancing away from the fixed point I had been staring at ever since I started walking.

"De rien, princess."

My eyes snapped to his in an instant, and I didn't see any amusement in them. Just curiosity.

I pushed his emotions aside and focused on my own so I could make it through the door, down the corridor, and into the ladies' room without letting the droopy yogurt (it smelled like strawberry banana, and it struck me as a bit uninventive that they hadn't chosen anything more pungent to douse me in) slide down my tresses and onto my lovely and very expensive new favorite coat.

All throughout Government, to which I arrived fifteen minutes late, I saw the glances and heard the stilted whispers behind me. Those same murmurs spread through the hallways like wildfire during passing period, and I heard them more clearly for what they were: hastily spread and entirely fabricated rumors based on hearsay and rooted in no actual fact. Which, I supposed, was the basic definition of a 'rumor'.

_"...heard she had an abortion and came here to avoid the backlash..."_

_"...that she flunked out of every school in France and no one else would take her..."_

_"...she's an orphan and the Archibalds took her in out of charity..."_

_"...isn't even really French, she's actually from Iowa and just acts like she's from France..."_

_"...had a total psychotic break and had to stay at the Ostroff Center for like a year..."_

_"...tried to kill herself by jumping out of the airplane mid-flight, but a stewardess stopped her..."_

_"...slept around so much she got all these STDs and some hospital here was the only one that could treat her..."_

_"...totally not a Waldorf, she's actually named Elsie Düsseldorf and used to live in Germany before she got kicked out for drugs..."_

_"...sex slave prostitution ring or something, and the FBI relocated her for her protection..."_

The stories only grew wilder and more fantastic with each retelling. By the end of Trigonometry, I was ready to pedal home on my pretty new bicycle and curl up by the sitting room fire with my tattered copy of the Italian printing of _Il Principe_ by my favorite Italian Renaissance diplomat Niccolò Machiavelli. It would be simplistic and satirical and perhaps give me some amusing perspective on the way simpler minds, such as Saffron's, operated on a day-to-day basis. Then, perhaps, I would be one little hop-skip-and-a-jump closer to taking the heinous bitch down once and for all.

For the sake of my own threadbare sanity, I ignored the chirping giggles that rose from beyond the back gates as I scampered down the same steps I had so casually ascended with Cedric's irritating camera clicking in my ear that beautiful, blue, faraway and virginal morning. When I came upon the school's bike rack and discovered a huddled mass of many styles, cuts, and colors of haphazardly arranged hair—notably missing was Lux's flaxen mane, and for that I was vaguely proud—surrounding the twisted remains of what had once been my dashing 6-speed bicycle, I sort of wished I had walked that day.

Saffron and her flunkies waved various tools of destruction at me as they brushed past and started toward the back doors. I stared rather forlornly at what had, for so short a time, been my one frivolous tie to some indistinct vestige of my old, carefree life, and felt a little bit like showing that unWaldorf weakness and crying at the unfairness of it.

What had my bicycle done to them, other than look sweet and pretty in its little slot?

If I hurried, I could clean up its remains and deposit them in a dumpster somewhere—hardly a suitable funeral, but it would have to do on short notice—and still catch up with Lux and Lex before they went home, changed, and went their separate ways for the remainder of the day. The Archibalds did not sit down for family dinners anymore, because—well, as I had observed at Thanksgiving, Nate and Aunt Jenny were barely holding together the pretense of being legally married, much less happily joined in beautiful and holy matrimony.

Another lonely night on my own; secluded dinner, homework, and perhaps a little mindless American TV before I went to sleep.

And Saffron had very thoroughly beaten me down with the most inane things...things I never would have thought of or imagined she would actually do. Sabotage, I was used to; deceit, betrayal, lies, cons, tricks, tests I was destined to fail, all of that I could handle without batting an eyelash; stealing boyfriends, ruining social lives, insulting outfits, trading bon mots and matching intelligence with a worthy opponent, I was comfortable with that. But mangling someone's bicycle? That was just heartless.

Just as I was about to start gathering the debris and bearing their cruel laughter as I tried to lug everything to a rancid trashcan somewhere, there was the sound of an engine—a revved up motor, more specifically, and something like exhaust under my nose. When I looked up, it was Maverick astride his Harley-Davidson motorcycle, which he parked at the curb and slid off of in order to give me a hand with the larger, more sharply dangerous distorted parts.

We didn't say a word, just held the dumpster lid open for each other as we deposited my mode of transportation into the dark abyss with other, less worthy forms of scrap. He handed me his helmet and told me to put it on as we made the short walk back, and I obeyed his command without thinking twice about it—riding a motorcycle home would be incalculably less depressing than walking all the way home in my stilettos.

Saffron was leaning against the motorcycle's seat when we returned, and her posse stood nearby to witness her final victory of the day. Surely the girl who had spent the majority of her afternoon Government class locked in the bathroom getting someone's half-eaten strawberry banana Yoplait out of her hair would not be able to keep her highly coveted cotillion escort when someone much cleaner smelling was available so nearby.

I briefly believed she would convince him—after all, my track record with twiggy blonde whores and tall, well-built chain smokers was not very stellar. The arches of my feet ached in protest at the very _thought _of roughing it all the way down 5th Avenue back to 74th Street.

"Maverick," she was attempting his debonair smirkile and failing marvelously. "Give me a lift to The Palace? You can come up for a drink after."

I slowly started inching the helmet back off my head, now concerned about what helmet hair I might have contracted, when Maverick reached over and pushed it back over my ears. "Keep that on, you'll need it."

The very disappointing imitation of a smirkile on Saffron's plastic face faltered and she pushed herself off the bike, the better to give Maverick an opportunity to peer down her tauntingly low-cut top. He moved past her, straddled the bike, and patted the backseat for me to join him. Emboldened by this newfound, somewhat tentative but no less appreciated ally, I tied my hair back with my key ribbon and carefully positioned myself behind him, conscious that if I didn't fold it just perfectly under my legs my skirt would fly up and show all of the Upper East Side my La Perlas.

Before I could get a good grip on Maverick's torso, he put up the kickstand, gunned the engine to life, and took off down the back stretch of street, from 0 to 40 in what had to be 2.5 seconds. _Maybe _3 seconds, tops. The wind stung at the speed we went tearing around the corner and onto busy afternoon 5th Avenue; we narrowly avoided a delivery truck, the likes of which I had seen too many during my time in New York, and Central Park zoomed past like a blurry Monet painting.

"Where do you live?" he asked when we stopped at a broken stoplight where a haggard cop was directing traffic.

"74th!" I shouted through the mouthpiece, wondering if he could even understand me over the wind. "Between 5th and Madison!"

He punched the gas as soon as the police officer gave the go ahead, and I tightened my grip on his midsection. I hadn't ridden on an honest-to-Dieu motorcycle in years, and had forgotten how exhilarating and _fucking terrifying_ it was to fly along at breakneck speed with nothing to the right or left of you except air and thousands of pounds of metal and rubber and glass. Already overly emotional from the less than satisfactory end to my school day, I buried my head against Maverick's back, closed my eyes, and tried to block out all the noise and coils of searing wind.

The bike went left, and I leaned my body with Maverick's as I knew I needed to, but past that I just cleared my mind.

_Tabula rasa, tabula rasa, tabula rasa_, I chanted in my mind. I had discovered years ago that actually _thinking _about a blank slate made it much easier to create one. Blackness surrounded me, cool and dark and soothing and calm, and no wretched little thoughts or words floated through my consciousness; I was simply floating in suspended animation, aware of the blood pumping in my body and the steady rhythm of my breathing, but unwilling to change either cadence through anxiety. _Tabula rasa, tabula rasa, tabula rasa..._

Then, there was a large, masculine hand around my wrist, and everything went from black and peacefully cold, to white and roasting hot.

_"You were the one I wanted to cage."_

_His words reverberated in the sharp green glimmer of his unblinking eyes, cut deep across my chest and dug into the crevices of my ears, the same time that he pressed his fingernail as firmly and as suddenly as a backhanded punch beneath my cheekbone, bruising and unforgiving, and tightening his four other fingers around the more giving flesh of my quivering neck._

_"A wounded bird..." his other hand pinned me against the wall and clenched around my wrists like iron shackles. His fathomless eyes bore into mine, rendering me incapable of looking anywhere but into their depths, hypnotized and weak and helpless. A mouse backed into the corner of a snake cage._

_"Is so beautiful when it's struggling to fly."_

_I did struggle like a bird beating its wings against a cage, or in that case his merciless palms._

_He enjoyed watching me try to escape, and when I opened my mouth to scream, he crushed his lips into mine._

_A needy grasp that exceeded his reach and sped the tempo of my breathing into a hopeless stretch of choked gasps as I tried to find air. The world was rushing at me with such speed, that the scenery streaked behind it like neon lights waving against a black night sky, but I saw those stripes extend and brighten in slow motion. Everything fell into a hushed and violent silence, and the world was still and moving and slamming my head back into the wall._

_Stars exploded in the air around me._

_I saw his face swimming over me, indistinct enough through the stars that I could see his Prince Charming cheekbones cutting sharp ridges above his jaw, Jeremy Dufour lips parted to allow hot air to permeate my skin without my permission—to warm every fleshy barricade and exposed crevice of my body with his proximity._

_Dark hair fell over his forehead in little tresses that teased the top of his brow, and the dark eyes that sat underneath that brow were so sharp they penetrated my dizzy panic with how very dark and green they were. And the smell that assaulted my nostrils and made the hair on my neck stand on end was Diesel Fuel For Life, and something raw and pure and male that smelled only of crisp and neutral soap and masculine sweat._

_My hips screamed for relief where his pressed into them, my legs almost gave out because he had me pressed so tightly between his body and the unmoving wall that my knees were locked in place and oxygen was having a hard time flowing to my brain because of the pressure of his chest against my chest. His tongue plunged into my mouth, probing and violating and licking my teeth possessively as it always had done. That time, though, it was more than a mere marking of territory—it was ownership, him claiming every inch of my mouth in his name._

_I choked on it when it stayed too long, and when he pulled it out, I received a very calm shove. My head collided with the wall again, cracking hard against the corner we were so near. He ground me against it, but there was no music pumping a beat in my veins, no grasping hands to grip the back of his collar or wrinkle his shirt beneath my needy fingers. Just more bruises forming, and tears falling, and breathing stirring the raw nerves on my face._

"The cause of all this young man's crimes was his desire to be well dressed." I suddenly heard papère's voice in my head, reading to me with his chin resting on top of my head with Les Misérables open on his knees. I was a little too big to be sitting in his lap, but it felt safe and the thunderstorm had scared me, and we were learning about Jean Valjean's long journey of redemption slowly but surely, and together. "The first grisette who had said to him, "You are handsome," had spattered a stain of darkness into his heart and had made a Cain of this Abel."

_His knee went between my thighs, pressing up against my core as I fought to keep my feet, even just my tiptoes where they arched down in my heels, in contact with the ground so I could feel like I was still in the world, still breathing and crying and living and really trapped in a school full of people—none of whom could help me._

_He was not and had never been Marius Pontmercy, and I certainly wasn't Cosette as I had always imagined._

_Éponine, perhaps. Dirty and full of holes, living a cold and dark life that I would somehow have to learn not to be afraid of._

_And he was Montparnasse._ A fashion-plate in misery and given to the commission of murders.

_His fingers broke through the gaps my buttons were looped through and tore them apart with quick, deft, unapologetic motions._

_I choked out a scream, finally, but this time when he jostled me, I actually blacked out. When I came to a few moments later, my shirt was off and he was making sort work of my underwear—once upon a time I had cherished every time we made it this far without someone barging in and interrupting us._

_Even though I had not been to church in seven years, I closed my eyes and mouthed a prayer._

God, somebody help me.

Ma mère combed through her curls a few times to show me how, then handed the brush over her shoulder and smiled encouragingly. "Sometimes you just have to learn to do things for yourself—I won't always be there to do them for you. Dorota will probably be there to do them for you, but on the extreme off-chance that she is taking a day off, you need to learn to be self-sufficient. Everything comes through practice, and practice...?"

I hopped onto her vanity bench and ran the brush lovingly over a different row of curls. "Makes perfect!"

_What had I ever done before to dissuade him from doing just this?_

_Memories flooded my brain, which was the furthest thing from tabula rasa at that moment, and suddenly my boy melted into his embrace, and I responded to his prying kisses with my own ministrations. I clenched my hands because I couldn't run my fingertips across his back or burrow them in his hair, but I could still push my body into his—no matter how much my throbbing hips screamed in complaint._

_Then, I felt my feet solidly on the ground. His knee had relaxed, and I had more control of my legs._

I kneed him right between the legs with such force that he toppled off the chaise lounge and onto the soft Arabian rug...

_There was no chaise lounge or Arabian rug, but I did knee him between the legs harder than I had ever done anything in my entire sixteen years of existence. I pressed my other leg into the floor, practically snapping the heel of my shoe, and drove up into his groin without thinking about what would happen if it didn't work, only that it had to work and I had to regain control of my hands and run as far away as my wobbly legs would carry me._

_God heard my prayer because my attacker collapsed to his knees. His fingers uncoiled themselves and went to his gut, and I ran and ran and ran, closing my shirt around my torso and suddenly realizing that my mascara had drawn two thick, black lines down my cheeks._

_"Tease!" I heard him yell, and it carried down the hallway and over the heads of my fellow jansoniens. "Fucking tease!"_

_I didn't stop running until I appeared in maman's bedroom doorway, and saw her snap shut an old box and lock it in her bedside drawer._

Maverick's hand grazed my fragile wrist bone and set ablaze the dead flames of discolored bruises.

"Don't touch me," I breathed, breath hitching inside my lungs as I ripped the helmet off my head and thrust it into his chest.

"Didn't mean anything by it." My escort took it imperturbably and raised his eyebrows at the way I gulped down mouthfuls of freezing air. "Not that I care, or anything, but are you all right?"

I jumped off the bike, held my Marc Jacobs purse in front of my body as some kind of high fashion shield, and nodded unevenly. "Fine. Thank you for the ride."

When I finally stopped my hand from shaking and turned the house key in its lock, I slid into the safety of that warm, familial-looking foyer and pretended a loving mother and father were waiting for me just down the hallway in the aromatic kitchen, where Dorota was baking pies for after dinner and Lux and Lex were just little kids like me—drawing pictures and shrieking with laughter over childish color schemes and disregarding the coloring books' fascist _lines_.

If I closed my eyes and pictured it, it was so real and my throat wasn't so dry.

I sank to my knees before I could take one single step into that fantasy, and broke down sobbing on the spotless hardwood floor.


	29. Will the Real Queen Bee Please Shut Up?

**A/N:** I've posted a new Chuck/Bair story, _In Fair Manhattan _-- don't worry, until this sucker is completed, it is my FIRST priority. However, FF has a great deal more _actual _Waldass than you've seen here, so for those of you anxiously awaiting that sort of action here should definitely check FF out for a quick fix in the meantime.

You can check out all the outfits Elle has worn up until now at my LiveJournal -- it's friends only, though, so comment my top entry to be added so you can view! I post other things in my LJ, like sneak peeks for upcoming chapters, pictures of what I think the characters look like, and updates on how the writing is going. Ch-ch-check it out. (Link provided in my profile.)

**CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE**_  
Will the Real Queen Bee Please Shut Up?_

Maverick, of course, had not been attending dance rehearsals.

I found this out when he and I happened to reach the same street corner at the same time just as the intersection's lights changed and we were shown the glaring red DON'T WALK hand signal. His motorcycle was in the shop and my bicycle was rotting in a junkyard somewhere, and it was impossible to get a cab at 4 PM; and while he got out of class half an hour after me and our curbside meeting never should have taken place, I had gone to the townhouse to change clothes, and therefore happened to stroll up to the intersection the same time he came to a stop just before the asphalt with his hands stuffed in his khaki pockets.

"Never?" I asked a bit cautiously, because I hadn't spoken to him once since my episode on the back of his Harley-Davidson.

He shrugged at me, checked his watch, then glanced up to examine the steady flow of traffic running back and forth in front of us.

"We are not late," I brushed my bangs aside and looked evenly at the glowing red hand. "But we might be if this light does not change."

"Will you freak out if I touch you?" he asked, and it was the first time he had made eye contact with me in days.

I blinked up at him and stammered for a reply, "Um, about that—I was just—"

Maverick grabbed my hand quite suddenly and tugged me into the street. I let out a small yell of protest and alarm, as the light had not changed from yellow to red, and in fact was still rather blatantly shining GREEN, meaning either one of us could be struck by an oncoming automobile at any given moment! I clenched my eyes, bracing my body and mind for the impact that would surely come—but all I felt were my flats beating against the black street, his fingers clenched around mine, and the rush of fear that negated any reservations I had about physical contact.

When I peeled my eyes open, we were safely under the shade of the traffic post across the street and Maverick had let go of my hand.

I turned to look for a rush of cars we had perhaps only _just _avoided, but found the street desolately empty as the lights blinked their changes and the red hand was replaced with a green person encouraging pedestrians to WALK.

"Merde, are you trying to kill me?" I hit him rather ineffectively on the arm in a fit of righteous anger. "It said _do not walk_!"

"There weren't any cars." He chuckled at me and ignored my tirade as we made our way farther down Fifth Avenue towards the studio.

When we finally reached the tall, gray building, he opened the pristine glass door and walked inside without stopping to hold it open for me, or even nudging it with his hand to allow me space to slip through. I stared at his figure past my foggy reflection and thought I should have listened to Julian when he had told me to _be careful_ with Maverick Sparks. Tristan, with all of his hang-ups and imperfections and vices, had never once let me touch a door handle.

Never once!

And where had his manners gone? Had he not held the school doors open for me after Saffron pelted me with strawberry banana yogurt?

I missed Lex.

But, then I glanced past my rude escort and saw a certain puffy-headed blonde sidling up to him, and decided maybe then wasn't the time to be wondering where his virtues were—after all, I wasn't going to the ball with him because I liked his natural musk. It was purely to spite 'Queen Saffron' and very effectively put another tally under to my name, as opposed to the two beneath hers.

**Elle**  
II  
Last season Prada and stealing Maverick

**Saffron**  
II  
Yogurt in hair and spreading rumors

I had a few more tricks up my sleeve, however, and would soon surpass even her best efforts. It was a great day to be me.

Despite the fact that I had to open the door for myself and touch the handle and think about how many unwashed hands had come into contact with it before my own pristine palm and fingertips, I found my way to my date, and smiled at my moral and loathsomely flirtatious and insufferably dressed enemy with as much fake sugar as I could squeeze from my pores.

"Where is your escort?" I inquired innocently, stressing the word '_your_' as lightly as I could to avoid sounding catty. "Or could you not find one?"

As I had known she would, Saffron blatantly ignored my thinly veiled civility and scowled. "I have one, but he is detained today."

"Oh, really?" I tried not to laugh. "Has he gotten his tux fitted yet? I heard it can be almost _impossible_ to take invisible people's measurements."

At that moment the old and refined dance instructor, Mrs. Prescott, clapped her hands together to draw her attention. Saffron flipped her hair over her shoulder and stalked across the room to Teddy, who was also escort-less and had the dubious honor of filling in as her stand-in for that afternoon. His dark eyes, however, were trained on the brilliantly red head of her sister, who stood nearby in vibrantly yellow stockings on the arm of a tall, thin, surly-faced blond whose angled eyebrows and puckered lips only meant he was a male runway model.

Teddy's jaw was tight with misery.

I didn't have time to focus on his dilemma though, for Mrs. Prescott arranged us in a circle and began pacing us to through the opening dance, as a gangling pianist watched us through large, bottle-top glasses over the top of the black baby grand in the corner. Our upper bodies remained structured and stiff as our legs stepped and crossed and turned and twirled. Maverick was a fast learner, but he sighed hugely every time he had to perform a particularly intricate movement, and more than once I considered elbowing him very hard in his presumably taut stomach—I mean, judging from his arms, which were absolutely solid as _rocks_ and thick as –

He was being incredibly difficult, and I was almost grateful when the music altered key and required us to change partners.

I settled my right hand into Teddy's as he slid his arm around to rest his hand on my upper back. Nearby, Maverick swept Scarlett into an easy embrace and began a simple but graceful English waltz at the same time as the rest of us. Teddy's eyes, invariably, wandered over my shoulder to rest on the figure of the person he so clearly and frantically wanted but was utterly incapable of attaining.

"Have you even said hello to her today?" I whispered, avoiding the fiercely judgmental gaze of Mrs. Prescott as she walked between our groups and corrected postures and techniques, and told one pair to 'look like your happy to be doing this, for God's sake—this is your debut, not your wedding day'. "It might be a good start."

"I was going to," he admitted in an equally quiet tone. "But then she looked at me and all I managed to say was _hell_."

Had we not been waltzing, I might have slapped my palm to my forehead in a dramatic display of despair. "Teddy!"

Mrs. Prescott's chin turned sharply to us and I quickly straightened my back and plastered on a pearly smile. Our feet moved in perfect parallel, our bodies swung like pendulums in time with the soothingly lush 30 bars per minute, 3 beats to a bar, which dictated our rigidly closed position and steered us slowly through our carefully choreographed steps.

"I know," he muttered, missing a step and almost stepping on my toes. I flawlessly avoided him and corrected our course.

Something rapped me hard on the shoulder, and I discovered it was Mrs. Prescott's wooden cane when I glanced backwards.

"The man leads, not you," she barked, before moving on to the next erroneous couple.

We changed direction along with the rest of our peers, twirling in and out of each other in flawless circles as we followed the line of dance and rearranged ourselves in a very untraditional diamond formation, which Mrs. Prescott informed us rather haughtily that she was known for the world over—her signature move. I could appreciate a good signature.

"Mais, well, before we leave then—tell her she dances very well, or something," I hissed, managing to hear Mrs. Prescott over myself.

She slapped her wooden cane against her hand and came to a sharp stop in the middle of everyone. "The ladies curtsey and offer their right hands; the men put their left arms behind them and accept with a bow." In _almost_ unison, the girls sunk into delicate curtsies and their partners took their hands a bit awkwardly as they inclined their torsos towards them. "And now, the men kiss the proffered hands and move to the left and back to their original partners."

Teddy nodded, but not in response to her instructions. I offered an encouraging smile as he slid to the left, and suddenly Maverick was in front of me again. He took me in his arms without much reservation, clearly assured that I would no longer 'freak out' if he touched me, and I very gently laid my left hand around the (very slightly bulging) back of his right arm. His right hand settled a little too low on my waist.

"That is inappropriate touching," I admonished as we began a new dance, a luscious Viennese waltz that Mrs. Prescott took very seriously; she threatened to rap us hard on the backs of our necks if any of us messed it up even slightly.

Maverick smirked and as we twirled in a romantic and constant natural clockwise turn while the other couples followed in our footsteps. The room became a blur around us and I would have felt dizzy from all the spinning, were it not for the dark anchor I found in the immeasurable fathoms in the pits of his violently blue eyes. I felt 20,000 leagues under the sea and a bit pressed for air when his hand pressed firmly into the small of my back, _very much_ not in the right place.

"That's my favorite kind of touching."

Julian's warning words reverberated in my head again as I glanced around for Mrs. Prescott and firmly moved his hand back to its proper home beneath my left shoulder. Before her hawk-like eyes could train-in on the way my own hand was quite absent from its required perch on his shoulder, I hastily replaced it and lifted my chin as regally I could to enhance the vision of a perfectly swirling fairytale prince and princess.

I imagined the skirt of my elegant dress, which Jenny assured me would be worthy of royalty and ready to wear by the 18th, fanning out around me, and the floor was not parquet but lavish and shining reflective marble on the floor of The Palace's most luxurious and royal ballroom. Maverick was in tails and a neatly arranged tie, his hair sitting evenly on his head, his ever-wandering fingers encased in fine white gloves.

That reminded me to remind _him_ that Jenny had already made his tie to perfectly match my gown, so he wouldn't have to purchase one to go with his suit. Of course, 60 measures per minute required a lot of continuous poised spinning, so I saved that for when we were more stationary.

After another run-through, Mrs. Prescott allowed us a break. I went to my purse to find the bottle of Evian I had pulled from the fridge in my haste to get out the townhouse door and to the studio on time, and when I turned around with its cool contents sliding down my throat, I was greeted with the sight of platinum-haired Lily van der Woodsen smiling at me.

I suspected she had moisturized three times a day in her youth, for there wasn't a single sheen of botox on her forehead or around her mouth.

"Good afternoon, Eleanor," she smiled and reminded me of Grace Kelly in every photograph and movie I had ever seen her in.

"Elle," I corrected after I managed to gulp down my water. "You can call me Elle, Ms. Van der Woodsen."

"Mrs. Humphrey," she corrected congenially, "technically. But you can, of course, call me Lily." I noticed she did not agree to call me 'Elle'.

Humphrey was what stuck out in my mind like a golden gong that had been struck by a large mallet. Humphrey as in 'Daniel Humphrey', author of the _New York Times_ bestseller _Gossip Girl_ and all-around bane of Blair Waldorf's existence (or so she so often told me)? Father of Cedric Humphrey, my own personal paparazzo? Humphrey, as in Aunt Jenny's maiden name? Lily van der Woodsen was really named Lily Humphrey?

Somehow, that didn't sound nearly as impressive. I understood why she still went by Van der Woodsen in polite circles.

"I watched you dance," she said, sitting down on the window bench and tucking her left ankle behind her right as she set her large quilted bag down on the parquet floor. I took the spot beside her when she graciously patted it with her diamond ring-free left hand. "You're very beautiful at it, just like your mother."

I cleared my throat and rearranged my features to look grateful. Blair Waldorf was, indeed, one of the most amazing dancers I had ever seen—I remembered her in an array of different sweeping dresses in countless chic styles and classic colors, in the arms of many handsome men as they guided her on the dance floor, while I stood by with carefully arranged hair and watched eagerly alongside a multitude of other little girls who thought they were in a fairytale. I had not inherited my talent from her, but it was flattering to even be compared to the woman I had once known as ma mère.

"Merci beaucoup."

"You have read the itinerary?" Lily removed her winter gloves and let them fall into her lap. I nodded and she returned the gesture with a sharp dip of her chin. "Good, then you'll be attending the Sunday brunch and the dinner party at the Plaza on Friday night?"

Jenny had informed me that she would go with me to the mother-daughter brunch at Arabelle, since I did not _have_ a mother nearby to accompany me, and that we would go for frozen yogurt at some place called 40 Carrots and she would show me some of her favorite places in Central Park. I wasn't entirely sure whether or not I should be _grateful_ that I had time to spend with her and pump her for any information she might accidentally let slip, or whether I should be dreading the experience as a torturous day full to the brim of things I wanted to avoid at all costs.

But, she had helped me pick out a very pretty abstractly printed silk periwinkle blue-and-white empire-waisted dress with a ruffled tiered skirt that fell just above my knees (to hint at what I would be wearing at the actual cotillion) plus the patent snake-embossed 3 ½" high Manolo Blahniks that would serve as the perfect accompaniment, and I really wanted to show the ensemble off. Therefore, the fake-mother/daughter brunch was basically required.

I had also intended to skip out on the Friday night party, but the pale gold goldfish print foil A-line Diane von Furstenberg dress in my closet was begging to be worn with my favorite pair of silver leather Oscar de la Renta slingbacks. I had a tragically beautiful aurum Judith Leiber minaudiere covered with multicolored Austrian crystals depicting a dragonfly alight a gorgeous pink flower, plated with brass that would _definitely_ outdo whatever tacky clutch Saffron would coordinate with her shoes, which undoubtedly would not complement her chosen ill-fitting and unimaginative dress at all.

...Okay, perhaps Cedric's dad's book was right and I was, by association, a label whore like Blair Waldorf.

There were worse things I could be. A monstrously bitchy plastic bimbo named _Saffron_, for instance. (What a stupid name.)

"Yes, I will be at both," I vowed, imagining how devastatingly more stunning than her I would look at each event. "Aunt Jenny is taking me to the brunch."

Lily nodded and reached into her bag, which I recognized as vintage Salvatore Ferragamo, and procured a list off of which she struck mine and Maverick's names with a felt pen. Then, she looked up at me and there was something stirring in the careful display of her features, the serene smoothness of her eyebrows and the delicate smile, and a light behind her face that read of some untold happiness or hidden joy. I imagined she had had some fortunate news that day, or something of that sort, but wondered at what could possibly be so providential to make her stare at me that adoringly.

"Good, I can't wait to see you there and find out more about you."

"More about me?" I capped my Evian and forgot to be polite for a second. "Why do you want to know about me?"

"Because," wryness grabbed the corners of her pink lips and she seemed to withhold a laugh, "you're an enigma."

"Me?" An enigma? That sounded exciting. I had always wanted to be an enigma. "Really?"

"To me, anyway." My eyes latched onto hers and she held my gaze for a long moment before her mobile rang. "Excuse me."

Mrs. Prescott was signaling for my return, so I put down my water bottle and returned to Maverick's side before I could be admonished.

The remainder of the dance lesson went very well, and Maverick didn't have to make physical contact with Saffron even _once_—all the switched partners dances either involved him with Scarlett and me with Teddy, or him with a willowy duchess who had recently moved to Manhattan with her father and mother and whose New York debut was almost as highly anticipated as my own.

...As soon as I got word out to the papers, of course. If grandmamma hadn't already beat me to it.

I switched off with a sort of clumsy St. Jude's boy who didn't make my skin crawl as pleasurably as Maverick did. It was more a feeling of disgust and less one of misguided desire, because he had probably stopped into a bakery on the way to the dance studio to partake in a particularly heady garlic bagel before the lesson.

When she was at last satisfied with us, Mrs. Prescott put her cane down on the wood floor and wished us luck on Saturday.

We dispersed, most of the girls heading to clump around Saffron and whisper about me, no doubt. The boys put back on their St. Jude's blazers and chatted about sports and the upcoming Christmas holiday and where they planned to spend it and with whom; Scarlett and Maverick broke away to the corner where she had set her Christian Dior tote, and commenced a hushed and rather passionate conversation that I really, really wished I could have eavesdropped on without being intensely obvious.

Instead, I returned to where Lily van der Woodsen/Humphrey sat still, speaking faintly on the phone. Her voice dropped to a mere whisper when she noticed my approach, but I was able to make out, "You know the board won't like that..." before she turned her head and covered her free ear, presumably to block out the sudden outbreak of high school chatter.

I knelt to put my Evian back in my satchel purse and strained my ears to hear the tail end of her telephone conversation.

"...All right. I will see you then, Charles."

_Charles._

_Charles._

_**Charles.**_

If I had forgotten the complex myriad of emotions from hearing Nate accidentally say 'Chuck' at the lunch table all those many eons ago in the dining room in Paris, every one of those sensations shocked through my bloodstream like a shot of adrenaline and starkly reminded me. I was refreshed, suddenly desperate for that name again, and wondered how many Charleses there could possibly be in Lily van der Woodsen/Humphrey's exclusive Upper East Side life. Then, I remembered she had been near Teddy the whole Thanksgiving night at grandmamma's penthouse, which strengthened my odds considerably. Was she looking after Teddy while his father was out of town? Did she _know_ Chuck Bass?

There were a few more hummed sentences, and then she slipped her phone back into her bag and stood up with it in tow.

"Good afternoon, Eleanor."

I smiled and watched her walk through the doorway, my heart thundering against my ribcage. I felt positive that if I peered down my shirt, I would see a bruise forming from under the skin, that was how hard my pulse raced and how deep my breath hitched.

That name turned me into crusader again. Who said I had to wait until Serena arrived to find out the truth?

There had to be plenty I could do in the meantime!

Teddy looked like he was screwing up the courage to approach Scarlett, but I predicted from the way her conversation with Maverick was ongoing and still rather private-looking that then was not exactly the right time to impress her with his gentlemanliness. I swung my purse over my arm and brushed my hair over my shoulders as I made a beeline for where he stood on the opposite side of the sunlit studio, when someone rather blonde and incredibly pesky stepped into my path and forced me to stop in my tracks.

Saffron was surrounded by her fellow debutante minions, arms crossed over her chest in some kind of smug victory over a battle I was not aware had already been fought—I certainly did not remember taking part in it.

"I'm lead deb, you know." Ah, there it was. "And I'm going to tell Lily van der Woodsen, the _chairwoman_ of the debutante ball committee, and my own personal family friend and business associate, to banish you from the cotillion."

How precious. She really did think she had won before even allowing me a chance to strike back. This was the perfect opportunity to put another tally beneath my name in our unwritten war, so I hastily caught Teddy's eye and tried to telepathically communicate to him _to not approach Scarlett_. He seemed to get the message, because he sunk into a rather distraught puddle of Bass misery against the wall behind him and stared glumly at his dapper Italian leather shoes.

"You can _tell _her that, of course," I forewent crossing my arms defensively, and instead put my hands on my hips matter-of-factly and openly. "But since she came to my house to deliver an invitation in person..."

Saffron's ladies-in-waiting looked at each other, the urge to explode in whispers latent and only suppressed because of their proximity to their undeserving and obviously unskilled queen. Did she not have someone on research, looking for prime opportunities, rather than spouting off whatever half-wit idea came into her brain? When _I_ was crowned Constance Billard's queen, I would have _two_ people on research at all times, and perhaps an outside PI to do the really messy work.

"Well," I finished, face neutral but angled upward just enough to make me look taller than her, "I doubt she will be sympathetic to your cause."

"I'll tell a committee member, then," she snapped, abandoning her cool just long enough to lose a bit of her underlings' respect. "Or I'll take it up with the people at The Palace. I happen to be one of their most influential guests, and the doormen happen to be _so freaking _fond of me. If I tell them not to let you in, then you will _not_ be allowed in."

"Should I be impressed that you have fucked enough of the help that they'll do whatever you want?" I retorted calmly, before any of the spectators had a chance to twitter silently to each other about how influential she was.

They gasped at my vulgarity, but I saw the impressed light go on in several of their eyes; I had stood up to their fearless leader before, but never had I so sharply and harshly rebuked her in front of her peers. I insulted her authority and the respect she demanded outright by not only accusing her of lowering herself to dallying with the people who waited on them hand-and-foot, but by using a very 'naughty' term to describe said repulsive act.

"You know what I think?" I composedly continued, frosting my voice with the chilling ice required of a _real_ monarch. "I think you are steaming mad, mon chouchou. Absolutely _furious_ that 'the new girl' managed to come along and sweep away the boy you so _desperately_—" I made 'desperately' rhyme rather successfully with 'pathetically' without outright saying it, "—wanted to go to your sweet little cotillion with."

It was almost comical how often Saffron was struck speechless. I half wanted to suggest that she go home and practice her ferocity in a mirror before she even attempted to go toe-to-toe with me in a battle of words; either that, or stick to the little middle school tricks of yogurt and gossip to spread her spider-like influence.

"And do you want to know the really funny part?" I lowered my voice and raised my lips in the same Maverickesque smirkile she had failed to recreate that Monday. "I do not even _need to do this_. I have already debuted," I paused for dramatic flair, which I knew she also could not duplicate no matter how hard she tried, "in Paris. This is just charity work for me. Lily van der Woodsen actually _asked me_ to grace you with my presence."

And, for the first time I had ever seen, Saffron actually fumed so much that her golden brown face turned exceptionally and unmistakably _red_.

I couldn't help it; I dreamed up the magic chalkboard in my mind and altered it accordingly:

**Elle**  
III  
Last season Prada, stealing Maverick, and outdoing the 'lead deb'

Another flash of red appeared, but it was her sister and not her own heady flush of anger intensifying. Scarlett looked from Saffron's clenched and shaking fists, to the insipid pout on her glossed lips—I swore I saw her teeth _gnashing_ behind them, to the deep set of her annoyed brow, then turned to me and reached for my hand.

"Elle!" She kissed both of my cheeks in the way I was accustomed to, and I returned the greeting routinely. Then, she let go of my hand and slipped her arm through the crook of my elbow instead, waving to Saffron over her shoulder, and steering me out the same way Lily had gone not five minutes before after saying _that name_. "Why don't we go grab dinner or something?"

"How can you possibly be related to her?" I asked curiously when we were back outside and she was leading me in the direction of Madison.

Scarlett laughed, a tinkling and melodic sound that made me understand just why Teddy liked her so wretchedly much. It wasn't just her slightly-freckled and porcelain good looks, which were stunning by anyone's standards much less the entire world's, but the laugh that tied her lips into a pretty bow and crinkled the carefully made up eyelids that sat just perfectly between her eyebrows and the tip of her upturned nose. I approved of his choice.

"We're step-sisters," she clarified, and we walked beneath sparse trees and underneath construction and past pet stores and right past several able looking cafés on our way to have dinner. "Different mothers, same father who was being very wicked at the time. He ended up with my mother for good eventually, and Saffron's mother sent her to live with us when the both of us were three and she heard how well off he was. She's actually okay, if you—"

"—Get to know her?" I laughed my own laugh and shook my head. "Do not think that is going to happen."

"I know she can be awful," Scarlett allowed, "and God knows she hates every single one of my guts, but I still remember the smiling little blonde girl in messy pigtails I used to play dolls and dress-up with, so you can understand how I'm sort of protective of her."

My mind's eye flashed a series of memories, all of them involving my own little blonde girl in messy pigtails, breaking my china dolls and refusing to apologize for her crime, raiding ma mère's closet with me and digging into the alluring and mysterious makeup drawer of her vanity to join me in inexpertly applying mascara and spreading bright red lipstick all over her cheeks and teeth.

"I understand."

We reached a sidewalk café decorated with timeless classic movie posters, and when I saw the silent movie playing on one of the walls inside and noticed a large mural of _Casablanca_, I knew Scarlett and I would be very good friends—this was just the sort of place I loved, especially since it was a sidewalk café decorated beautifully with gorgeous flowers lining the exterior.

We ordered jumbo shrimp & watercress shu mai and pan seared mahi mahi for dinner, tiramisu with espresso sauce and apple spring rolls for dessert, and she a passionfruit cosmo and me a strawberry-mint gin tini to start; and we sat beneath the awning in the cold and crisp winter air and didn't speak for a few minutes between sips and people-watching. I half-hoped there was a trained paparazzo (anyone but Cedric, basically) hiding in the foliage to snap a picture of the world-famous fashion model in her natural habitat with 'unidentified stunning brunette friend', and was only slightly disappointed when I heard no clicking and saw no flashes.

The arrival of an avid fan of hers filled the companionable silence, and when Scarlett autographed the napkin _Scarlett Rose_, I thought of something.

"Why do you go by Scarlett Rose if your last name is Kennedy?"

Uncle Aaron had introduced her as his 'other sort-of-niece', which meant that they might also be sort of related the way he and I were, which _sort of_ added a squicky vaguely incestuous factor to Teddy's blazing hot crush if things turned out how I hoped they would and he and I wound up also being sort of related.

Oh, what a headache.

"Rose is my middle name," she answered, as soon as the gushing fan was out of sight. "It's a stage name to keep attention off my family."

"Oh." I had forgotten all about her school file, which had indeed read **Kennedy, Scarlett Rose** in official-looking large Courier font. "How do you know Uncle Aaron?"

Scarlett frowned in bewilderment for a moment before connecting the dots. "Oh, he does commissions for my mom and dad. He went to school with them, or something, so he does them kind of as presents, like for our birthdays or at Christmastime. We should be getting one sent to us by his personal courier along with a pound of chocolates any day now."

_That _was a relief. Now I could fully support this potential union between her and Teddy again! I opened my mouth to ask what she thought of him, but she set down her half-empty glass and cut me off.

"My turn to ask a question." She unfolded her napkin and spread the creases out of it as she spoke. "How the _hell_ did you convince Maverick to take you to the ball? He not only hates formal affairs, he positively _loathes_ them. I can't wait to see him in tails and a tie and in _white gloves_. I'll need all of your pictures just to save the memory for perfectly untainted posterity!"

My opening had arrived. TWO openings, in fact. I could learn more about her complex relationship with my escort, _and_ pimp out all of Teddy's finer qualities while I was at it. I beamed, not entirely from the recollection of Maverick agreeing to take me to cotillion on _the 18th it is, princess_... the flush on my face was also not at ALL from that reminiscence, just from the sheer excitement of how much I was about to help Teddy. Not anything to do with the way he had looked so handsome standing at the top of the steps like he _owned them_ and smoking his Camel cigarette as he consented...

"I asked," I said breezily, hoping to jump over that topic and onto more important ones before the temperature under my skin rose 30 degrees.

"So, how come you did not ask him to take you? You two seem like you are friends or something, just from what I have noticed offhand here and there around school and..." I realized then how _not _stealthy I was, "...stuff."

Perhaps in revenge for the way I had glazed over her question, she hopped right over mine. "We're just friends." Then, she suddenly turned sheepish and fingered the rim of her glass looking a bit discomfited. "I actually don't have a proper escort; I had to ask one of my other friends to stand in with me today so I could do the steps with a partner."

Chimes rang and chirped and dinged in my head. _She didn't have a date!_ Perfect.

"You know..." I began innocently as a waiter set my plate in front of me along with a glass of water. "Teddy is on the list of escorts, but he has not made any offers to accompany any of the other debs, so..."

"Teddy Bass?"

I nodded cheerfully at her ready recognition of his name. That was a good sign!

"I doubt he wants to go with me," she paused to chew on her shrimp. "He's been angry at me for weeks."

_Huh?_

"He is not angry at you," I insisted, going through the mental catalogue of information I had about his feelings for her, all of which included the big, bold, and artfully arranged letters L, O, V, and E.

He had only ever spoken of her with extreme tenderness and desire, had never once indicated that he wished her ill will—only waxed and waned about all the different colors of red and orange in her hair and how she looked like an expertly commissioned painting done by a master artist with a great love and appreciation for the subject. It was all very boring and sappy.

Scarlett shook her head, insisting that _she, _not me, was the correct one. "No, I'm sure he is. A few weeks ago, we were both at my friend Monica's 17th birthday party in TriBeCa, and he dumped his drink on my dress and hasn't spoken to me since."

"...Oh." I was sure it was just a big misunderstanding—he had accidentally spilled it! Then, he had reacted the way I suspected Teddy would in that situation and slunk off quickly to avoid further humiliating himself, therefore making himself look like a total jackass in front of his lady love. What a lovable idiot he was turning out to be.

"But, if he asked you," I prompted, swallowing a bite of food, "would you say yes?"

My dinner companion shrugged and finished off her cosmopolitan before she answered, "I wouldn't say no."

We parted ways as soon as we finished dessert and paid our parts of the check, and when I was sure she had disappeared around the corner to hail a cab back to St. Mark's Place and, undoubtedly, Maverick Sparks' company (not that I was jealous, because I was NOT jealous at all—she had said it herself, they were friends, and even Saffron had said so which meant it was true, because Saffron would probably kill her sister if she tried to hone in on 'her' man, so I was NOT jealous at all), I pulled out my mobile and pressed number 3 on my speed dial.

The phone rang three or four times before Teddy answered in a despondent voice, "Hello, Elle."

"She thinks you are mad at her," I told him flat-out, glancing up and down the street to make sure it was safe to cross as Maverick had so recently taught me was possible to do without expressed stoplight permission. "So you should probably clear that misunderstanding up and ask her to the ball, because she said if you _did_ ask her, she would not say no."

"Really?" He sounded significantly more cheerful.

"Yes, but she also thinks you are mad at her. Focus." I reached the opposite sidewalk and started walking. "Where do you live?"

"What?" I envisioned him rubbing the top of his head and frowning in incomprehension. "Why?"

"So I can come over, dummy." I put up my arm and managed to flag down a yellow taxicab. "What's your address?"

He gave it and I relayed it to the impatient cab driver before sliding into the backseat and shutting the door behind me.

"I'll be there soon," I said into the phone. "So we can sort through this whole fiasco."

When I reached the elaborate hotel building Teddy had instructed me to go to, I rode the lift to the very top floor after giving my name to the man behind the front desk and waiting for Teddy to buzz down permission for me to enter the triplex penthouse. The sleek elevator doors slid quietly open and I stepped into a very modern yet overwhelmingly expensive-looking living room. A startlingly breathtaking view of Upper Manhattan sparkled in its large, almost floor-to-ceiling windows.

Teddy came down the stairs just as I set my purse down on one of the cream colored couches. "She thinks I'm mad at her?"

"Yes," I confirmed on autopilot, too struck by the fact that, all of the sudden, I was in the _Bass house_. Chuck Bass lived in the very penthouse I was standing in, ate breakfast in its kitchen, drank at the bar, sat on the cream couch I was so very close to, had a bedroom up the stairs Teddy had just descended, with a closet probably full of his clothes in a room full of pictures and clues about who he really was.

The same thrill I got from hearing his very name flooded my blood and colored my vision.

"She said you poured a drink on her and stormed off?"

He instantly groaned and sank into a chair by one of the windows. "No, no, no...I knew it...She hates me..."

"Shut up," I instructed, perching on the edge of the cream couch and dusting off my skirt. "_She _does not hate _you_. She thinks _you_ hate _her_."

"Oh, God," he covered his face and I rolled my eyes. "That's worse."

"Teddy!" I snapped my fingers abruptly to break him out of his stale 'poor forlorn boy in unrequited love' act. "Pull it together!"

"I have to apologize," he decided, to which I whispered '_Duh'_, "and you said I should ask her to the ball?"

"_Yes_," I stressed, folding my hands over my knees. "Ask her to the damn cotillion and she will go with you, okay? Je sacre par Dieu..."

Teddy agreed almost silently with a very small noise of assent and took a few deep, calming breaths as he probably thought about all of the different ways he could bring up that topic in a casual conversation without looking like he had planned it—I knew that's what I would have been doing, if I was him. I took that time to glance at the art hanging from the walls, to appreciate and loathe the fact that there were no gaudy family portraits taking up space and announcing to all visitors that 'a happy family lives here!'. That's what it was like at the Archibald townhouse, but I dearly craved a look at what the handsome man in my photograph looked like seventeen years later.

"So, is there an office where we can sit down and write out a list of the things you have to do?"

I knew that would prompt him to get up—Theodore Bass lived for lists.

He led me up the stairs and into a muted room dominated by a large fine mahogany desk. An imposing black safe sat regally behind it, locked and bolted, a red light blinking slowly beside its combination keypad. Also behind the desk, hanging dead center on the wall, was a large painting of the island of Manhattan as it must have looked before the Dutch purchased it from the natives in exchange for trade goods.

The photographs on the desk were generic, with one of those loathsome 'a happy family is in this picture!' pictures of the Archibalds near one of the corners, and a gilded frame containing another picture of the magnificently and darkly beautiful Misty Bass within its clasps. I hesitated to pick it up, but touched the reflective glass surface delicately as Teddy rummaged through the drawers for some paper and a pen.

"How did you find out her name?"

Teddy looked up and saw what I was gazing at, and his eyes went silent. "I had to look it up. Dad would never tell me."

I frowned and caressed her two-dimensional cheek. "You had to look it up?"

"At the library, because there was nothing on the internet about him marrying anybody." He set some printer paper on top of a lightly dusty desk calendar that was still set on September, and grabbed a pen from within the top drawer. "I had to search through old newspaper archives, until I found a snippet talking about Misty Parker marrying the CEO of Bass Industries, and then something about them having a son."

"And that would be you," I assumed meditatively. _No mention of a daughter?_

He sat down in his father's chair behind his father's desk, and looked rather achingly like a boy playing dress-up and pretending to be grown up—as Lux and I had once done in too-big heels with clown faces in front of a gorgeous woman's vanity.

"Have you looked in his room for any clues about her?" I pressed, needing to know more about the glamorous pin-up woman from my daydreams and wanting, perhaps, to get even a tiny glimpse into that important bedroom.

But Teddy's eyes went from silent to noisy in one second flat and he tousled his hair awkwardly. "Dad's room is locked unless he's here. He has a key, and the butler has a key so he can go in there once a month and dust and vacuum and stuff. No one else is allowed in there, ever, not the maids, not anyone. Not even me." He pressed the pen to the paper and wrote out _How to Apologize to Scarlett_ at the top of it. "Especially not me..."

Chuck Bass, of course, had his own secrets to guard. It seemed he and Blair Waldorf had a lot in common.


	30. Knot Comes Loose

**CHAPTER THIRTY  
**_Knot Comes Loose_

"Do you have the newspaper article?" I asked, peeking at Teddy's reflection in a glass book case on the other side of the room.

I got no response from him, save unintelligible and subdued murmurings as he finished composing one of his famously well-organized and handwritten lists; this one was for the explicit purpose of earning him the girl of his dreams as a date to the debutante ball, and as I stared at the furrowed brow over his intense gaze, at the disgusting way he gnawed his father's expensive felt-tip pen between his teeth and pondered what items he had forgotten, I smiled at the simplicity of it.

He was just a 16 year old boy who wanted a date to the big dance. It was...almost precious.

To avoid emasculating what little manhood he felt he possessed, I averted my eyes and ran my gaze instead along the list of titles Chuck Bass kept stocked in his private home office. There were numerous books which meant nothing to me: histories of various places to which I had never dreamed of traveling, and a number of the old classics one would expect to find in any handsome-looking collection amassed by a quality interior decorator. _The Call of the Wild, The Red Badge of Courage, The Devil's Dictionary, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Turn of the Screw, Heart of Darkness, Moby Dick, A Christmas Carol, The Age of Innocence_... All arranged in alphabetical order, all seemingly untouched and unopened, filmy with dust and neglect.

I sighed and tilted my head back in exasperation, and that was when my eyes landed on _Les Liaisons dangereuses_ in its original French by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos. And others stood alongside it: _Hotel Pastis_ and _Chasing Cézanne_ by Peter Mayle, _Chocolat_ by Joanne Harris, _The Fly-Truffler_ by Gustaf Sobin... _Les Misérables_ and _Notre-Dame de Paris_ by Victor Hugo.

These books _had _been touched, and often—I could tell from the little discolorations along their spines. Though they had been carefully cared for, dusted, and returned to their moors by a steady hand, I imagined their pages might almost be coming apart at the seams, some words might be faded from the pressure of lingering hands, corners might be bent and creased or even torn away...

I was sixteen the first time I set foot in Chuck Bass's private office without supervision. I tugged nervously on the bow tie trim of the wide white satin band I had used to push my bangs away from my forehead, before my curiosity prodded all feelings of apprehension out of my stomach and told me I had better get a move on before Teddy glanced up and discovered my snooping. So, pretending quite fervently that I was all alone a world away in an off-limits library, I ran my fingertips along the Brazilian rosewood outlining the doors and slowly undid the latch.

I didn't waste time savoring the moment, though to my mind it seemed enormously significant, and I searched the shelf for the first book I wanted to examine: _Les Misérables_, of course. But if I expected a new and precious photograph to fall out of its creases and into my palms, I was very disappointed; it was just a novel, read many times and very well studied, underlined and highlighted at significant passages to mark things its reader found of interest.

The other books were, likewise, just a careful assortment of published works. I flipped through _The Fly-Truffler_, feeling for anything that didn't belong between its pages, but all I found when I inspected it closer was the synopsis printed on its back. Perhaps it would make for interesting reading one night when I was too preoccupied by memories and disappointments to sleep.

'_In France, a fly-truffler finds truffles by stalking the flies that lay their eggs in their vicinity. After the death of his wife, Philippe Cabassac finds in the truffles he seeks more than an exquisite flavor: they bring dreams of his lost love that become increasingly real.'_

It sounded mysterious and dark, so I exchanged it for one I was much more familiar with.

'_Vivianne Rocher moves to the tiny French town of Lansquenet to open a chocolate boutique, and, suddenly, strange things start to happen.'_

Something made me stop and re-read, slowly, the inadequate summary of Joanne Harris_'_ _Chocolat_. I had spent liesurely evenings with the novel situated primly on my lap; had eagerly digested its words by the lights of fires, lamps, the moon, my flashlight, anything nearby that could grant illumination; I knew the story, its characters, the sequence of events, and had thoroughly enjoyed the movie. Nothing about that little book should have taken me very off-guard.

But something did.

'_The tiny French town of Lansquenet.'_

What had _The Fly-Truffler_ been about? I tucked _Chocolat_ under my arm and practically lunged for the book I had abandoned so thoughtlessly.

'_In France, a fly-truffler finds truffles by stalking... After the death of his wife...dreams of his lost love...'_

I stared back-and-forth at the two novels in my hands, then up at the ones I had not yet touched sitting innocently on the shelf.

_Simon Shaw restarts his life in Provence, renovating an old police station into a small but world-class hotel... A photographer in the south of France spots a Cézanne being loaded into a truck and... This novel, which travels between Paris, Provence, and New York, is a fun and sometimes chaotic romp with...friends and lovers... moves to a tiny French town..._

_Notre-Dame de Paris_. _Les Misérables. __Les Liaisons dangereuses._

All in their original French.

Hidden away in the pitch black behind those treasures, I found a travel guide for France (on its map the towns of Lyon and Paris were circled in red Sharpie), an assortment of Edgar Allen Poe's more famous collected works, with the stories 'Berenice', 'Ligeia', 'Morella', 'The Oval Portrait', and 'The Philosophy of Composition' dog-eared and bookmarked.

As I reached my arm around _Notre-Dame de Paris_ in hopes of making another big discovery, someone cleared their throat and I remembered with a sudden start that I wasn't alone.

Teddy had pushed out of his father's desk chair and was standing next to me with his hands tucked all too casually in his pockets. His eyebrows were raised as he stared curiously at the large number of books that very clearly _didn't_ belong to me that sat incriminatingly in my embrace. "What are you doing?"

"Nothing," I lied rather horribly, pulling the last book down from its shadowy perch and smiling wanly. "Investigating?"

"These are my father's." Teddy's hands darted out to take back the peaceful I had uncouthly disturbed. "We shouldn't be touching his stuff."

"I know, but—" I glanced down at the final volume and stopped short. "_Le Petit Prince_?"

It wasn't the simple white cover I was used to, but the little blonde boy standing precariously on the edge of his lonely gray planet was the same, even if the sky behind him was deep and blue and foreign. It was also _not_ the version I had received early in my English tutelage but, like the Victor Hugo and Pierre Choderlos de Laclos books dominating their top shelf, printed in the language Antoine de Saint-Exupéry had penned it.

My language.

"Yes," Teddy replied, and his lips quirked sardonically. "I used it to learn French when I was six. Have you read it?"

I ignored his silly question—of _course_ I had read _The Little Prince_, was he clinically insane?—and held the book protectively against my lower stomach when he tried to snatch it from my grasp. It was a struggle, but I was trying to riddle out the meaning of all these books—why they were all set in France, why Chuck Bass would circle in blood red ink the cities I had lived in, why he would hide all this in the darkness.

"Hand it over," he groused, fingers prodding around my arms for a weakness, but I held firm. "Elle, give it."

"Parlez-vous français?"

"Bien sûr," Teddy said impatiently, grabbing at the book with undiminished vigor. "Since I was seven. Pourquoi?"

I shook my head. "Ce n'est rien."

Then, I tightened my fingers around the edges of the blue copy of _Le Petit Prince_ and pulled against Teddy when his own fingers clutched and found a surface to grab hold of. We engaged in something like a tug-of-war, only it was much more physical and involved a lot more twirling around in endless circles as he ordered me to 'Give it' and I shouted various phrases in a range of languages, all of which meant 'No!'

Something in my chest told me not to let go, to keep dragging and heaving until he relented, but the hard granite in Teddy's eyes told me something in _his_ chest was guiding him to do the very same thing. I gritted my teeth and locked my jaw and yanked with all my might—

—and the spine split right down the middle and the whole thing came apart in both our hands.

I expected a lot of loud, angry yelling to follow this. Sheaves of paper twisted and danced in the air, and floated peacefully to rest at our feet; little bits of the spine imbedded themselves in the dark carpet and hid between the fibers; the front cover, which I had clenched between my fingers, broke apart from the spine altogether and felt dead and cold against my palm.

There was a fluttering noise, and even more paper fell to the floor.

My attention was so focused on watching Teddy's lips, on waiting for them to tense and part and unleash a string of angry expletives, that I paid this swift descent little notice; but apparently I had not learned enough about Teddy's character to make judgments about what his reaction should have been. He sank to his knees, very calmly, and knelt to pick up just those last folded pieces.

He looked their blank backs with puckered concetration I did not understand, then unfolded them carefully and held them out for me to read.

"I don't have the newspaper article," he finally answered my question as he put his left foot on the floor and launched himself up to stand tall in front of me. "But I do have this letter she wrote to me."

He pushed it into my hands when I didn't make a forward move, and my first instinct was to throw it right back in his face. Not out of anger or violent rejection, but because like the books I had torn from Chuck Bass's book case, the letter Misty Bass had left for her child did _not_ belong to me. The texture was not that of paper bound and mass produced for the world to gaze upon, but flimsy and delicate, and very faintly scented with perfume—whimsical and fragrant, like the pages from a woman's personal diary.

"Read it."

My eyes lowered without my brain's permission, and I did what he said.

_I wonder about the future when I won't be here to take care of him. I dreamed a dream just now, a dream so vivid and real and absolute that I when I woke from it, I didn't have the courage to go back to sleep. Instead, I left him in the big bed alone and came into the kitchen to make some tea and sit, and write, and distract myself. But diaries aren't for distraction, are they? They're for catharsis and all the thoughts you think during the day and cannot say until the night. So, since it's pitch black outside and the comfort of his arms and the softness of our sheets has never been so frightening, I'll stay in here and sip and write. _

_I decided on his name the first time I saw that sonogram, where his head rounded and turned into darkness, and decided I would have his father write that name on the birth certificate when I'm unable to. Because I won't be able to. I fancied I'd come up with some whimsical yet still distinguished nickname for him to go by, just what a Bass baby needs to survive and stay sane in the busy corporate world he'll undoubtedly be thrust into. I haven't yet decided on his middle name, even though I've poured through the baby book about seven hundred times to find something fitting. I even stared for hours at that first sonogram, wondering if another name would call to me, but nothing has yet. _

_I have to decide soon, because I won't be around to choose one when he's born. _

_My dream was so very real, almost a waking dream or a premonition. I've had premonitions before – I dreamed of my baby before I even knew he existed, all dark hair and black eyes and pretty smiling lips. With my unearthly beauty, and I'm being so very modest right now I should win a prize for it (do they have a Pulitzer for modesty?), he'll be just so incredibly handsome and heartbreaking that it's almost a good thing I won't be here to see it. I would just interfere with the parade of girls who will certainly crowd his doorway – I hope he finds someone to calm his roaming spirit like I managed to calm his father's. But who knows? Bass men are almost an entirely different breed unto themselves. _

_I realize this is less a diary entry and more of a letter. I hope he reads it one day, perhaps finds it tucked away in the back corner of some dark, dusty library years and years after he's forgotten me or the warmth of my stomach or the sound of my voice humming to him just before we go to sleep. _

_Baby, if you read this, I love you and I didn't want to leave. But I didn't have a choice. _

_Of course, I won't tell your father this because he'll refuse to accept it and fight like hell to keep it from coming true. But I believe in fate, and destiny, and in purpose, and my purpose is to be the vessel that gives you life and the graceful shadow that steps aside and claims no ownership of your soul. You are your father's to shape and teach and mold, and I know it will be difficult because no one seems to be able to talk any sense into him except for me, but you'll be me for him and that will make it hard for him to show he cares. He'll probably be away a lot, leave you to your own devices, and in that way you'll become strong. You'll become your own person. _

_Maybe in the darkness of the night, a dark night like this one where the rain falls so heavy on the windows that I almost can't hear the scratch of this pen on the paper, you'll wake from a dream and see me in the window where the droplets hit and fall and drip. They're not tears, but little messages you'll have to decipher and know that I am watching over you. I will always be watching over you, baby, and I will always love you no matter how far away I go. To you it will seem very far, farther than just an ocean away, or a continent away, or a hemisphere away. But no matter how far away I go, no matter how many miles or eons or light-years I fly, I will always, always be nearby. _

_I suspect you'll be a meddler, like me. This is good. I willingly leave this gift to you, along with sharp wit, aristocratic boredness your father and his roughly-cut nouveau riche manners can never accomplish (as much as I undyingly love him), and a fine taste in silk scarves. Remember that everyone must have a signature and mine is a silk scarf and, as your mother, I decree it should be yours as well – silk and patterned, it must be patterned in a way that befits your complexion and style and fine taste. Mine is Hermès, but I urge you to shop around and find your own. _

_Anything else I might have taught you, anything less superficial than scarves or beauty, you will have to find out on your own. _

_I know you will, because you will also be like your father as much as I think you won't want to admit it. Which is why I have just decided to give you his name, so you'll always remember where you come from and what is expected of you, and that you can overcome your challenges with straightforwardness and determination and sheer guts. That is what he will give to you. _

_So, Charlie baby, I love you, and I will see you someday. Not soon, because I command you to live a long and prosperous life, but someday...someday in the very distant future, I promise I will hug you and kiss your forehead even if you grimace with boyish disgust. I'm your mother, it's my right. _

_Carry my picture for luck. _

_Love,  
Your mother_

I focused rather pointedly on one word, written innocently and with great care, at the bottom of the letter. It was a word I had seen before, penned in a different hand on the pages of another woman's diary—written just as lovingly and with the same quavering tremble that made its 'C' a little uneven and drew the tail of its final letter out just a half an inch too long, as if completing it meant it would never be written again.

"She left it for me to find," he told me, when it became clear that I was finished. "At least, I think she did. It was in this book when I started French lessons, and I just figured I was supposed to read it. That's why I carry her picture around in my wallet all the time, because..." Teddy paused and for a moment I thought he was through. But then, he cleared his throat, blinked a little more rapidly than was completely normal, and continued, "Because she told me it would bring me luck."

"For you to find?" I whispered, still caught on those seven letters that spelled a name which changed everything. "But your name is Teddy."

"Yes," he agreed, attempting to sort out the mess we had made of his book. "But it was supposed to be Charlie."

I almost choked on my breath. "What?"

He frowned at my reaction and looked down on me with a hint of concern in his eyes. "Dad told me that he and mom were going to name me Charles Bartholomew Bass II, but after I was born my godmother saw me in my crib and said I looked like a teddy bear, so dad changed it."

"Your godmother?" My words still would not come out in more than a throttled sigh, but he heard me plain enough. "Who's your godmother?"

"Oh, you know her," he said, gently taking my half of _Le Petit Prince_ from me and setting it neatly atop his own. "Serena van der Woodsen."


	31. Je Ne Sais Pas

**A/N: **This chapter was a bit tricky to write, considering it doesn't really have one set _theme_ to go on as most of my chapters do. The dirty truth is, I wanted to reveal all the things revealed in this chapter before cotillion, I didn't want to waste a lot of time doing it and delay the big event for you guys any longer, and there was a chapter to fill in between 30 and 32. Yes, I'm the first to admit that this is pretty much some filler, but if there is such a thing as _substantial_ filler, then this is it. But, never fear, for the next chapter is...well, let's just say it is not.

Oh, also, I didn't go over this chapter very well after I wrote it -- maybe once or twice. So if you spot any spelling errors or missing words or incorrect words, or anything like that, go ahead and slap it in a review. You can even be condescending if you want, I won't mind.

Enjoy and see you for chapter 32.

xoxo

DISCLAIMER: I can't say this enough times, so I will say it yet again: I do not own Gossip Girl, nor any of the characters Cecily created, nor any of the scenarios she dreamed up in her books, nor any of the situations Josh Schwartz has put them through on the show. Teddy, Maverick, and Lux are really all **mibzilla**'s and I'm just wearing water wings in the pool with them; the rest came out of my head.

**CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE**_  
Je Ne Sais Pas_

The thought wouldn't leave me alone. It was a nagging little thing, like a gnat peppering my face with stinging attacks, returning tenfold no matter how many times I swatted my hands against it. It followed me all that night, in the cab on the way to the Archibald townhouse, as I ascended the stairs to the guest room, as I nodded listlessly at Lux's inquiring face and shut my bedroom door behind me without a single word.

_Charlie._

While I bathed in the clawfoot tub and listened to calming music over the hidden Bose speakers, while I ran my brush 99 times through my hair and paid maintenance to the silky locks that added curl, bounce, and body to its natural pin straightness.

_Charlie_.

It echoed, and reverberated, and shrieked in my brain.

Before the cab ride, I asked Teddy to please get me a glass of water. While he went in search of a maid or butler to carry out the task, I knelt down at the bottom of the glass bookcase and opened the hand-carved Brazilian rosewood cupboard doors that sat beneath Chuck Bass's public collection. On the shelf inside were more books, most of them in French, all of them set in France, and behind them were folders full of intriguing but uninspiring information.

Teddy returned with my beverage as I stood up and saw the reflection he had once dominated in the now closed glass doors. His father's empty desk, a crooked sheaf of paper weighted down by an expensive tooth-marked pen taking up its otherwise empty and decorative space, and behind it a large, regal black safe. It was locked, bolted, and a red light blinked beside its combination keypad.

"Here," he said, cupping my hands around the sweating glass for me, and making his way back to the desk. "I think I've got it all figured out."

"I don't," I whispered to myself, staring at the safe as if it were the Holy Grail itself. "I don't have it figured out at all."

"What's that?" Teddy poised his pen over the bottom of his list, and waited patiently. When I shrugged and found a nearby chair to sink into, he cleared his throat, wrote one last item in his quick but elegantly legible hand, then raised the list to eye level and read aloud: "Number one, explain everything to Scar—Scarlett. Number two, say her name without stumbling all over it and messing it up. Number three, say two words to her without stumbling all over them and messing them up. Number four –"

"Have more self-confidence," I instructed on autopilot, swirling the ice in my glass and trying to clear my vision.

"...That too, but give her blue flowers when I talk to her."

I gulped down a long swig of water and tilted my head, glad for something else to focus on. "Why blue?"

"It's her favorite color," Teddy informed me incredulously, as if amazed I did not know. "I'll look more appealing and she'll think of me whenever she sees blue. I thought _you_ were an expert at this stuff?" I blinked and silently vowed to let him continue without further interruption. "Number five, be wearing her favorite cologne. Number six, tell her I think she is very pretty and fascinating."

"Pretty?" I promptly broke my promise. "She's more than pretty. Tell her she's stunning or hot or gorgeous or something."

Teddy hesitated, looking unsure about what he was thinking; then, he muttered something that made me realize he was _way _more than an average 16 year old boy, and that he had way more natural charm and intuitive understanding of the feminine mystique than even I did. "People say those things to her all the time. And she _is_—" he fumbled over his words the way I hoped he wouldn't when he finally did face her "—it's just, she's also really pretty, and I don't think she hears it a lot."

I formed my lips into the shape of an 'o' and nodded.

"Number seven, ask who she is going to cotillion with. Number eight, say that I don't have an escort either. Number nine, suggest we go together as friends. Number ten, try to hold in all urges to jump around and shout and make an idiot of myself until she's out of earshot."

It was a very good list. I told him this, even as I stared over his left shoulder at that blinking red light. Was it a camera? A silent alarm? Did Chuck Bass's safe require voice activation, or a thumb print, or some special retinal scan to open? And if it did, what would his password be? I examined the dark, wavering image in my glass of water.

Sharp, defined, angular jaw; pinched lips that formed a natural frowning pout; a high forehead covered by full dark chocolate brown bangs; and thoughtful eyes framed by thick, blooming lashes. My cheeks were round and full, and flushed from the inundation of information that my unready brain was not willing to comprehend, and I all at once had the urge to stand, cross the length of the room, and once again gaze at the picture of Misty Bass that sat on the corner of Chuck's desk.

Her face met mine and I couldn't deny it anymore, but I didn't know _what_ it was I couldn't deny. All I knew was somehow, some way, no matter how farfetched or impossible, I was related to her and she meant something to me—the same way she meant something to Teddy, maybe even the same way she meant something to Chuck. But he had only been married once, and it was a question of to whom; obviously Teddy did not want to hear a single unsupported word about Blair Waldorf having once been Blair Bass. And, even if he did, I was not fully ready to part with what little evidence I did have.

A sonogram kept locked in her abandoned blue bedroom. A name written in diary entries.

_Charlie_.

That night, I climbed under my covers and, for the first time in a very long time, pressed the button on my faithful flashlight to re-read Blair's diary. It seemed smaller than I remembered, and the picture I set gently on my pillow top was older, more faded, less substantial—like the vivid dreams I had and could not remember as soon as my lashes parted. But the words were the same, as much from her brain and memory as they always had been, always inked with a lace of loathing for the fact that someone had made her keep a diary to sort through feelings they did not think she was capable of understanding without an outlet.

I understood how that must have felt.

When I was done, and I curled into a ball to let sleep finally claim me, I knew three things for certain. I did not know the specifics, the hows, the whys, the wheres, or the whens; I could not explain _how_ I knew, or even think too long on those glaring facts lest I second guess my gut reaction and let all my hard work be in vain. But I closed my eyes and clenched them tight, my right hand buried beneath the pillow to touch that precious, secret fortune I had slumbered on top of for ten long years.

The people in its white frame were Chuck Bass and Blair Waldorf. Another picture had told me they were married on December 27th, 2010.

The third fact... the third fact I did not dare think but once, until I could sit with Serena and ask her for the truth.

Sunday, December 12th, had all the makings of a great day from the moment I opened my eyes and saw the pretty, intricately carved designs on the multi-planes of the guest room ceiling. Pale yellow sunlight pierced the gaps of the curtains and lit the snowy white carpet with squares and rectangles that illuminated the twirling, dancing dust that skipped through the air.

I remembered distantly the dream I had stirred from, which had contained jewelry box dancers in painted dresses with ruby smiles and diamond clear eyes, in a ballroom with a king and queen, and a jester. The specifics filtered through that mental hourglass that drains away all memories of all good dreams, and by the time I pushed the downy covers off my legs and settled my frozen feet in the warm confines of my fuzzy slippers, I did not remember much at all.

Only that I had worn blue.

After my quick shower—I no longer reveled in baths the way I once had—the silk periwinkle dress hanging from the back of the walk-in closet door no longer seemed fitting. Despite the patches of warm sunshine I felt radiating through the closed windows and the full effect of the townhouse's central heating system, I knew the air outside was bitter and quite literally very icy; it had snowed the evening before, laid glistening white snowflakes on the ground before they melted into the pavement.

My shoes wouldn't do either.

So, ignoring the memory of the pleased look Aunt Jenny had worn upon coordinating the outfit with me, I dug through my closet and found something more appropriate: A dress with a loose, deep purple top and flowing, gathered elbow-length sleeves; its skirt fell to the tops of my knees in silken, asymmetrical shades of eggplant and thistle. I let my hair tumble around my shoulders in loose, structured waves, and pinned part of it back with a silver-toned crystal-beaded Jennifer Ouellette barrette.

When Aunt Jenny opened the door at 11:10, undoubtedly to tell me to hurry up and that we were running late, I was already toasty and warm in black tights and vibrant cherry red Christian Louboutin suede boots (my absolute favorite color combination was, and always had been, red with purple), and had just finished transferring the last of my indispensable items into a medium-sized clutch.

"That isn't the dress we decided on," she said after a brief pause and a swift evaluation of the particular superpower I liked to think of as my own—the ability to put together a tragically chic outfit in under five minutes and look gracefully flawless every time. Aunt Jenny blinked once she recovered from the unexpected sight, though I could tell by the degree to which she raised her eyebrows that she didn't exactly think my replacement ensemble was anywhere near hideous.

I shrugged and ran my fingers carefully through my hair to create a little more volume. "I am ready if you are."

Though it was only ten blocks down Madison Avenue to East 64th Street and the Hotel Plaza Athénée, Jenny and I slipped into the back of the shiny black town car, burrowed inside layers and layers of warm winter coats, scarves, gloves, and hats. The air was astonishingly glacial for such a bright, cheerful looking clear blue day, but I personally preferred the thought of a little picturesque snowfall to the toasty air that blew under the car's front seat and blistered against my calves.

I always looked best in a red pea coat, against a backdrop of pure, fluffy white powder.

The doorman opened the door for us, a practice I was slowly adjusting to as it seemed to happen everywhere I went (as long as Maverick wasn't with me), and we shed our bulky garments at the front desk for the coat check before walking to the hotel's Arabelle Restaurant. Most of the debutantes and their mothers were already present when we reached our section of circular little white tables. White candles rested in their centers, docked in golden little holders and surrounded by gilded plates, shimmering cutlery, and fresh bouquets of winter flowers.

Saffron caught my eye beside the tall, auburn-haired woman I knew to be her step-mother of sorts, and smirked. I beamed brightly at Lily, who was standing regally right beside her; I profoundly enjoyed the look of extreme displeasure on my enemy's heavily made up face when Jenny waggled her fingers and Lily excused herself from what was clearly a _riveting _conversation to join us instead.

"Thank goodness," Lily breathed, smiling politely but sighing exasperatedly. "That girl is a lot to handle."

"That is Saffron," I informed Jenny tactfully, certain that she hadn't the faintest clue about the identity of the girl who mercilessly bossed her daughter around; and, predictably, when Jenny nodded it was the very definition of disinterested. She was probably too wrapped up in her fabulous fashion label to spare a single thought on the two people suffering underneath her own roof.

I hoped Lux went to live with Nate when he divorced her.

Lily led us to our table near the center of the room and, to my surprise, joined us there as the waiters began taking orders.

"Have you prepared your presentation?" she solicited immediately, just like the perfect cotillion organizer she was.

I asked the waiter for some orange juice and a plate of freshly sliced assorted fruit with cottage cheese, then folded my hands decorously over the lacey tablecloth and nodded. We discussed what I wanted to do with my future (act on Broadway), whether or not I would attend college in the States or return to Europe for university once I completed my high school education (I still desperately wanted to go to Conservatoire National Supérieur d'Art Dramatique), what charities I was most interested in devoting my time and money to (anything that considered puppies a top priority), and where I most liked to spend my summers (Tuscany).

"So, Eleanor." When I was halfway through a sumptuous bite of grapefruit, Lily thoughtlessly flicked a stray platinum strand away from her smooth forehead, and suddenly the conversation veered onto an entirely different track. "We've talked about everything that's meant to impress me and convince me that you're a refined, upstanding young lady. Would you mind if I ask you something personal?"

Jenny was smiling into her napkin, and something about the lightness in Lily's voice made me wary of mumbling a confused "Yes?"

"What do you _actually_ do for fun?"

The grapefruit slid stoutly down my throat and I coughed in a bit of its juice. "Fun?"

"Please," her eyes finally brightened and sparkled congenially at me, "I know you don't think volunteering at dog shelters is a fun party."

"Actually," I stuttered, a bit off-kilter; I had never before been asked something about the _real_ me at a societal event, and was therefore unsure if I should play along with her assumption and gush too much about how I loved attending good old depraved nightclub raves on Sunday nights, or if I should reply with stunned and candid honesty. Did she want to know all about my amateur sleuthing, or that I preferred to spend my school nights in bed with a good book?

In the end, my brain decided it did not want to do that much thinking, and settled on prodding the words "I love dogs" out of my mouth.

"Really?" Lily folded her hands under her chin, fascinated.

"I have four."

Fortunately, it seemed I made the right choice; Jenny went on to discuss all the different pets I had owned and cared for in my lifetime, and that if the committee was looking for a debutante who was sincerely dedicated to the causes listed on her 3X5 note card, then I was their girl. I felt conflicted between hating her for presuming to believe she knew me so well just because I sent her a Christmas card every December and a birthday card every Spring, and loving her for remembering that my current fluffy white bunny was named Waffles and that I had rescued him from a cosmetics testing company.

When our plates were cleared away and the time came for the committee members to mingle with other tables, Lily dabbed needlessly at invisible crumbs on her lips and gave me a hug that lasted precisely half a second too long to be considered merely polite. I sensed she had something she wanted to say because when she pulled away, she left her palms resting softly on my shoulders. And, for a very long moment, she stared at the sweep of my bangs where they fell across my forehead.

Then, she smiled slightly and moved to a neighboring table.

I hadn't been able to ask her any of my burning questions about her connection with Chuck Bass, which made less and less sense the more and more I pondered it, but the thought of which intrigued me more than any other lead I had stumbled across since my arrival in New York City. Jenny had not spared me any warning looks over her obligatory morning coffee, but I had not felt comfortable enough in her company to encroach on the subject of just who _Charles _was and when Lily Humphrey would be seeing him.

Nate was tight-lipped as he had been since that afternoon in Paris, both before my life had changed forever in front of the steps of Janson and _when_ it had changed forever the moment I saw that name literally shatter Blair Waldorf from her stupor. Eric had meant well, but could act only as a compass that pointed to cotillion, December 18th, 2027, the only night I would be able to see Serena in the flesh.

Of all the adults I knew, she was the one who treasured my confidence above all else. Grandmamma and saba would undoubtedly call Blair the minute I left the penthouse and tell her all about my curiosity; I had spent more than a few nights in the guest bedroom staring out the window and hoping Eric would not let our secret meeting let slip in front of my godfather or Aunt Jenny. The information I had whispered to Lux underneath her bedcovers and in front of her sentinel stuffed animals was safe, as long as she _remembered_ it was safe and as long as Lex hadn't happened to hear us through the wall that separated their bedrooms.

But I did not want to wait for Serena. Six days was far too long after ten torturous years, and her mother felt so unconnected from anything in my world that I thought anything she divulged would have to be untainted and factual, unsoiled by bias or abiding loyalty to any other party.

I decided I would wait until she slipped off to the restroom or departed for the bar, and then I would excuse myself from the party by saying I needed to make a phone call.

She flittered around the room and made small talk, indulged parents by looking at family photographs in wallets and on cell phone screens, chuckled and laughed at little comments people made in the white morning light, gesticulated with fluid hands that served to punctuate silent points I could barely make out by reading her thin, merry lips.

Finally, her cell phone pulsed in her pocket, and she quickly apologized to a family of diplomats before putting it to her ear and gliding to the exit.

When my opportunity came, I took it without hesitation. Jenny nodded at my rather flimsy pretext—who would I need to call at noon on a Sunday?—and told me to hurry back before any of the other committee members came searching for me, so I sputtered something about only being a minute and darted out of my chair to catch up with Lily van der Woodsen/Humphrey's quickly disappearing form.

And then, as she always seemed to do, Saffron Kennedy came between me and my goal and stopped me short.

"What do you want?" I snapped impatiently, watching the platinum blonde hair and slender shoulders edge through the doors.

Saffron merely smirked, and my focus slammed back to her insipid face. It appeared she had taken my silent advice and practiced in a mirror.

"Isn't that Mrs. Archibald?" she queried, nodding with her eyes to the slim figure in my peripheral vision.

Out of the corner of my eye, I also saw Scarlett watching us with concern. I decided to cut the confrontation short, both for her sake and for my own—on the other end of Lily Humphrey's cell phone could be a voice I had dreamt about in foggy misery for more than half my life. I could not engage in petty rivalries when he was potentially so close that I had the chance to _hear him_. Saffron was good for my self-esteem, most days; she served as a stepping stone on the path of rebuilding the inherent self-confidence Sophie and Tristan had stolen from me.

I could, and _would_, earn the respect of everyone at Constance Billard and prove to myself that I wasn't a failure.

But, that would have wait for a more convenient time.

"Yes, it is. Now if you'll excuse me –"

Saffron lithely stepped in front of me again, her arms crossed neatly over her shimmering gray dress. "You came with Lux's mother?"

A small gust of a sigh blew through a small hole of frustration in my throat, and I nodded impatiently. "_Yes_, now if you don't mind –"

I managed to squeeze between her and a rather affronted-looking old society matron's chair. Before I managed to take three strides in Lily's Prada clad footsteps, that piercing voice I was so used to hearing shriek shoddily constructed insults in my face, suddenly lowered in pitch and lashed out from behind me in quietly cold tones I had never assumed it was capable of.

"Don't have one of your own?"

Without my permission, my body revolved itself on one Christian Louboutin heel and came face-to-face with...her back. She had not even turned.

"What did you just say?" My voice was lower too, but not in pitch or tone. Its melody was that of a meek and injured sparrow.

"I hear you don't have a mother," Saffron rephrased her statement, putting one golden-brown hand on her glittering hip as she glanced at me over her bare shoulder. "Or at least, that's what Lux tells me. She wouldn't give me details, but I'm putting money down that she abandoned your ugly ass the minute she realized what a pathetic little whelp you are."

Through my dazed sense of betrayal and anger, I recognized that perhaps she had also invested in a thesaurus.

"And you're trying to find out who your father is, too?" The Queen Bee chuckled mirthlessly, and tossed her head like a prize mare so that her artfully messy ponytail flung over her shoulder and coiled just so down the line of her back. "Let me guess, whoever your mother was, she was such a slut that she couldn't even remember which of her undoubtedly _many _lovers might be responsible for your sad little existence?"

She finally turned, finely plucked eyebrows raised in amusement at my parted lips and wide eyes.

"As for your cute little plan to dethrone me..." Her breath tickled the underside of my nose when she leaned in far too close. "Good _luck_."

And, for the first time in all our many tiny confrontations, _I_ was the one left speechless in _her_ triumphant wake.

Lily eventually returned from her phone call, but I was too busy staring into the depths of my half-empty glass of orange juice to bemoan the abandoned chance. The chair beside me scraped against the floor when Jenny shifted it towards me, and the light shifted as she ducked her head to observe the many emotions I was sure had been flickering across my face for the better part of fifteen minutes.

My best friend and confidante had betrayed me.

I had no clue why—perhaps Saffron had offered her unlimited power in her kingdom once she reigned hellfire down on the world and assumed her role as Ultimate Hell Bitch of All Dimensions, or maybe it had been in exchange for a week's worth of immunity from lunch on the front steps—but I didn't really care. I should have listened to my instincts that first day of school and braved the new environment alone...

I never should have taken her aside that night and laid out my plan in full detail, never should have mentioned Blair Waldorf or Chuck Bass, or my intentions of stealing the throne.

I never should have trusted her. Mindless minions, I should have remembered, are _mindless _minions for a reason.

The worst part was, as much as my insides felt all at once empty and laden, still and fluttering, untied and painfully knotted, Saffron had made a very good point. Of course, Misty Bass had _not _been a 'slut' who could not identify her child's father, and that slight would have to be avenged sooner or later; likewise, I knew exactly who my mother and father were—knew it in my very heart and soul, because every time I looked in the mirror it became harder and harder to even pretend to deny it.

But she was absolutely right in that I _didn't_ have a mother of my own.

I had given her up, and willingly. I didn't have the right to call her mine.

"Elle?" Jenny whispered my name cautiously. Her hands, I saw, were itching to reach out and touch my hair or tilt my chin upwards so I would meet her gaze, but they stayed curled in little fists atop her lap. "Is everything all right?"

"Je ne sais pas," I replied, almost in a prayerful whisper, wringing my fingers in knots and gazing listlessly at my knees.

Nothing made sense—I had spent so much time denying it, that to accept the truth had been staring me in the face was too devastating to leave much room for any other thoughts or regrets. I avoided Lux, but she avoided me in return and it felt more like a silent agreement than a round of cold shoulders. I went to class, did my French homework without any snide remarks or thinly veiled insults, dressed in unimaginative ensembles with sensible shoes and warm wool coats, and stopped thinking about pestering people.

For the first time since I arrived in New York, I just left everyone alone. And it was remarkable how easily I _did_ fade into the background. Saffron retained her noble title, her handmaidens doted on her every whim and shot me nasty glares across the courtyard, and everything for the girls and boys of Constance Billard and St. Jude's went back to, relatively, normal.

The cotillion was the next day, which set the student body buzzing about what who was wearing and who they were arriving with in what vehicle, what newspapers were covering the event and how they could convince the photographers and reporters to zero in on them and their escort and their evening out, and above all else—who still did not have an escort, and would likely be presented alongside a charity case with no name recognition in a second-rate suit.

From what I gathered, Scarlett was not entirely bothered by this particular brand of chatter. After all, she did have her dishy male model friend on call as a backup plan if _a certain someone_ failed to follow through with his special list. When I saw Teddy hike up the front stairs with a bouquet of blue hydrangeas, I broke into my first real smile in days and gently elbowed the object of his deep and incessant affections, who was sitting next to me listening to her iPod as she doodled haphazard sketches in her notebook.

"What?" she asked, but his approach was her answer.

"Um, hi," he greeted. I crossed two sets of fingers underneath the stone table and bit my lip in anticipation.

"Hi, Teddy." Scarlett parted her red lips across her perfect rows of teeth, and I thought that would be his undoing.

Instead, Teddy stood a little straighter and cleared his throat nervously. "I just wanted to apologize. Because I, uh...heard that you think I'm mad at you," I dutifully looked away when Scarlett turned to glance at me over her shoulder, "and I just wanted to say that I...um. Am not. Mad at you, that is. I'm not. I actually—well, uh..."

Scarlett shook her head and tried to put him out of his misery. "Don't worry about it. Just a misunderstanding."

"Yes!" he exclaimed, causing both of us to jump at his volume. "Yes. Uh...a misunderstanding. You're very pretty."

It was so like a horrific car crash in motion that I put my face in my hands to block my view.

"And interesting! And...here."

I peeked between my fingers and saw him clumsily offer the sweet little bouquet, which was vibrant and fully blossomed in the gray morning light. They were simple little flowers, unadorned with garnishes and unaccompanied by a special vase or fine, expensive chocolates, and I thought perhaps I should have had Lex coach Teddy a bit harder on the art of wooing—he honestly and very obviously meant well, but the execution was so shoddy that I seriously doubted a girl of Scarlett Rose's world-class beauty and celebrity would be swayed.

The poor thing. He was going to have to observe cotillion from the sidelines, or dance with Saffron assuming my hunch was correct and she really _didn't_ have an escort. I would probably offer to dance with him for a few waltzes, given I didn't spot Serena right away and could convince Maverick to hand me off...it would be the least I could do, after I promised him his big break and let him down right at the finish line. He looked so restrainedly eager, from the way his lips were drawn in a single, ramrod straight line beneath his wide brown eyes and arched, hopeful eyebrows.

I only prayed she let him down gently.

"Thank you." I shut my eyes and tried not to envision how his face would crumple when she sent him away. "That's sweet."

_Here she goes._ I tried to prepare myself for the fatal blow, but had a feeling nothing could brace poor Teddy for the heartbreak.

"I heard you don't have an escort for the cotillion?"

"No, I don't."

"Why don't we go together?"

"That sounds great. What time should we meet?"

..._Wait a second_.

_Did Scarlett just ask _him _to go with _her_?_

I replayed the scenario in my mind's eye to see if it could possibly be true. Scarlett had _definitely_ said 'I heard you don't have an escort for the cotillion?', because I remembered hearing her sniff the flowers just before, and there had been a hint of a pleased smile in her voice as she politely inquired. Then Teddy had responded after a gulp, 'No, I don't.'

And after a brief pause, Scarlett had asked 'Why don't we go together?'

_Mon dieu!_

My hands fell to the table and I stared, half in disbelief and half in delight, at the beaming face of my partner-in-crime as he arranged to pick her up at her apartment in his limousine, because it made much more sense for them to arrive together than to force her to hail a cab and join him at The Palace. He winked at me as he asked what the color of her dress was, so he could have his butler raid his closet for a matching tie and cummerbund, and she waved a hand and told him not to worry about coordination, that whatever color he chose to wear would be just fine with her.

And they walked together towards the school, discussing the merits of harmonization versus clashing in regards to fashion.

I promptly broke rule number ten and scared a few lower classmen with my excited and highly undignified cries of joy.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you," I looked up to the puffy, gloom-ridden sky, and grinned when a stray ray of sunshine burst through the clouds.

At least something had _finally _gone the way it was meant to.


	32. House of Cards

**CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO**_  
House of Cards_

I found it more than a little disturbing how _right_ his long fingers felt wrapped around the top of my bare arm. As if he had never pressed flesh to flesh hard enough to stain a royal bruise on fearful white porcelain; as if he had only ever cradled and gently caressed and cherished and left his mark in breadcrumb trails of sweet, possessive kisses.

When he turned me around to face him, it was as if we were back on Avenue Henri Martin in scarves and fashionably upturned hats. When he ran his thumb across my lower lip, I did not shudder or protest as I should have—as I had every right to do; it was as if we were on our couch in Blair Waldorf's living room, or turning around and around in hot water inside the claw-foot tub in my private bathroom. When his eyes swept up and down my body, that is just how naked I felt; raw and unprotected and unable to feel ashamed, whether or not that was the appropriate emotion.

I just stared, somehow unsurprised that he had found his way across the sea to me. Had a little part of me been waiting for him to be around every corner? Had it started before his calls or after? Would a little part of me always feel like it could forgive him, could still want him, could still try to live up to everything he said he wanted?

"Tristan?" It was scarcely more than a dreamy whisper.

The smirk on Saffron's face told me that, somehow, she was instrumental in his presence. I had not paid attention to her presentation, but perhaps I should have—perhaps then I would have seen him looking dashing in white tie, the tails of his jacket sweeping the backs of his barely ticklish knees.

Perhaps I would have been better prepared for the dent his being there put in my plan.

His lips parted wolfishly over sharp, pearly white teeth, and his fingers suddenly stiffened and tried to puncture my skin.

"Bonjour, ma petite." His breath spread hot over my face and stirred the little hairs on the back of my neck. "I've come to collect."

_**Several hours earlier...**_

Everything was more or less in place: my hair had been pinned into a tricky but elegant up-do that allowed my strapless dress to show off the slim curve of my shoulders, my delicately-applied makeup was dry and as immaculate as it was going to get without a magic wand, my shoes added a good four inches to my diminutive height and would make dancing with my 6' escort less of a nightmare, and said escort was due to pick me up from the Archibald townhouse at any minute.

Lux had come into my room about thirty minutes earlier, wincing somewhat apologetically at the outraged shouts and accusations that flew back and forth beneath our feet, and had offered her unsolicited help in straightening the tight ruched bodice that fit against me like a second skin. The gown's sweetheart neckline created just the right stage for the pretty silver necklace I had chosen from a window display at Tiffany's, and without bothering to thank her for her assistance, I moved to my jewelry box to complete the ensemble with a pair of solitaire diamond earrings.

"You look nice," she offered, hovering on the threshold and trying valiantly to ignore the words flying from her father's mouth.

I looked up at her in the mirror's reflection and nodded once. "Merci beaucoup."

"I don't speak—" We both bit our bottom lips at the same time, only mine resulted in the smear of my artfully chosen shade of lipstick melting onto my teeth. "...De rien."

We did not come to a silent agreement, or vow never to let another power-starved badly-dressed wannabe queen bee come between us ever again. There were no secretive shared smiles or flickering light of acceptance in either of our eyes, but I did quietly close the lid of my jewelry box and clear my throat.

"I have to finish getting ready."

With another soft click, she was gone and I was alone. The muffled sounds of her parents' argument still reached my ears, seeped up through the fluffy carpet and permeated the good mood I had tried to foster for myself all day through indulgent aromatherapy candles, personal massage therapists, a fresh manicure and complimentary pedicure, soft music, happy thoughts... I had tried, but it was hard to ignore the tension that had sprung up around Lex's decision to forgo cotillion in favor of an intimate evening alone with Julian.

Nate had been enjoying a peaceful bliss that came from staunch denial of his son's sexuality; Jenny was trying to be supportive, but she too felt the strain from the unforeseen course their little boy's life had taken. They were both angry at each other for reasons unknown, reasons that had absolutely nothing to do with Lex or his steady boyfriend, nor with the way they had raised him, nor with anything that could not be traced back to the gaping wide trenches in their damaged relationship.

_I got pregnant too soon...I wasn't ready to be married...I did my best to support you...I didn't need you to support me...My father was right about this entire situation, we never should have stayed together...Should have had an abortion...Babies don't make marriages...Why are we fighting about this _now!?_...I tried to tell you this years ago but you wouldn't listen!...All I do is listen to you, listen to you complain about how horrible your life is with me...If it's so horrible why don't we end it...Fine with me, I've wanted to end it for a long time...I want you out of this house...It's my house too, you can't _force me _to leave...I want you packed up and gone in the morning, and don't try to win any sympathy from any of us...Any of "us", as if I'm not even part of this family...You're not, and you shouldn't be, and you never have been!_

It got progressively worse the longer the three of us tiptoed around them and let them at each other's throats. I wanted to descend the stairs and poke my head in the living room to remind them that there were other people in this house, people who had lives to lead and self-esteem to keep in tact, and that they should probably keep their resentment to themselves if they wanted to have any children after this. But, one chastisement could not patch up years and years of issues.

Instead, I checked the time on my brand new, Tristan-free mobile phone, and went to look out the window for some sign of my date.

Just as I unhooked the lock and swung the doors open to allow my room some fresh air, I heard it. A low rumbling and an acceleration as it drew nearer, a squeak of the back tire as it turned the corner, the chug-a-lug of the engine as it came to a stop right at the curb and Maverick, in his tails and white gloves, swung his left leg over the seat of his Harley-Davidson and brushed himself off.

He expected me to ride to cotillion in a custom made dress with my hair done just right on the back of his _motorcycle_.

And, instead of walking up to the front door and knocking politely like any self-respecting gentleman would have done, he blinked against the sun and caught sight of me watching him from my third-story window. He shaded his eyes with his right hand, to confirm it was _me_ staring at him with an unabashedly horrified expression on my Vogue-ified face, then grinned slightly and held up a white helmet.

"Are you coming or not?"

I blinked down at him, my elbows resting on the windowsill the only things keeping me at all upright, and looked from the parked motorcycle to the small helmet in his hands—it wasn't the helmet he had let me borrow for the ride he had charitably given me upon the destruction of my six-speed, but a new one entirely. It looked as if it would fit snugly over my ears.

If my hair was not in an immaculate, picture-perfect _up-do_.

"Are you _kidding_ or not?"

His arm dropped to his side and took up residence in the pocket of his tailored trousers. "What's funny?"

"The fact that you expect me to ride all the way to The Palace on the back of your motorbike!"

An amused grin flourished across his long face and widened his strong, square jaw. "Just get down here, princess."

In a fit of outraged shock, I grabbed my clutch off the end of my bed and ran down the stairs so quickly I almost did not catch the tail-end of the quarrel from the other side of the wall. My thoughts were too wild to comprehend anything but the pounding of my heart and the _thud thud thud_ of my high-heeled feet on the carpeted stairs. Was he insane? Was he trying to drive _me _insane? If so, his plan was working spectacularly.

I thought of the tens of thousands of ways I would verbally assault him and inform him, in no uncertain terms, that the honor of escorting me to the debutante ball was irrevocably and _very definitely_ revoked; I would sweet talk Nate's driver into giving me a lift in the town car, because its pristine leather seats would be much easier on my pale blue skirt than would the smelly and stained taxicabs I had come to loathe.

He probably wouldn't care—would probably go home and change into that stupid leather jacket he always wore and go find a group of people to chain smoke with him outside a convenience store while he waited for his lovely friend Scarlett to finish her business with Teddy. Well, I hoped they enjoyed their midnight trip to Gem Spa, and they could very well laugh over the frivolity of my anger as long as my ensemble was in one piece by the time I managed to get my godmother Serena alone for question-and-answer time.

When I tore out of the front door, I expected to have a helmet thrust over my ears, or to see Maverick astride the Harley-Davidson with an impatiently smug look at my cumbersome gown. What I did _not_ expect to see was a pristine white limo sitting where not _one minute ago_ his beloved motorbike had been parked, nor did I expect to see the respectable chauffeur holding the back door open for me while Maverick smirked with his arms crossed over his chest.

"Surprised?"

He eyed me up and down in that languidly slow way of his, and I found myself pausing just long enough for him to appreciate the way the light struck my face and threw dark gold highlights across the crown of my head. Before he could make a lewd remark and shatter the sliver of forgiveness I was thinking of granting him, I crossed the sidewalk to the open door and slid across the cool backseat.

The weight shifted when he joined me, and then we were in gray darkness when the door slammed shut behind him.

I didn't tell him that I had imagined us walking to The Palace, him complaining about the fact that he had to parade himself in front of a scrutinizing audience of old women for several hours, me hiking up my skirts and walking carefully around grates to avoid ruining hem or heel; or that I had also considered him pulling up to the front door in one of those tacky city buses and making me pay a fare before we could jaunt to Midtown in all our finery amidst the squalor. The motorcycle had never entered my equation, and a pretty white limo had certainly not even been in the realm of my thoughts.

I wasn't surprised, though. More like _impressed_.

But I made sure not to tell him that. It was better, in the long run, to keep his inflated ego under control.

The limo driver turned onto Madison Avenue and weaved as best he could in and out of delivery vans, charter buses full of tourists who pressed their faces to the glass to try and peer fruitlessly into our tinted windows, renegade yellow taxicabs, and New Yorkers (both drivers and pedestrians) who observed traffic laws as more _inconvenient suggestions_ than actual rules.

When we hit 60th Street and more and more tall buildings sprang up around us, I gazed at the flickering reflection of the limo passing through store windows and thought about how different this cotillion was from my first one. Blair had been there to help me get ready, for one, with Dorota on standby and a glass of champagne cooling in an ice bucket in front of my bed. Before I slipped into my heavenly white dress, we danced around to silly American music and debated over which perfume I should dab on, what earrings would go with the shimmering embroidery at the bottom of my gown's skirt, whether or not the shoes I had selected really completed the ensemble or whether we should just say to hell with it and go buy a new pair.

She had disappeared for over thirty minutes after Dorota buttoned me into the bodice and performed a few finishing touches on my hair. When she returned, it was with a deep blue box that I immediately recognized to contain the mysterious necklace she hid away in her bedroom. And when she opened it and showed it to me, my eyes practically leaped out of my head at the sheer sparkling opulence of it: little flowers dangled from the chain and in the center, a heart to rest between the clavicles.

"I wore this to my debutante ball," she had told me, gently removing it from its perch and wrapping it around my neck. It was not heavy at all for something so adorned with diamonds and brilliant platinum, but practically weightless where it sat against my lightly browned skin. "I thought you might want to as well."

I had examined my reflection in the vanity mirror, straightened all the little charms so they laid perfectly straight, and admired the way it complimented my throat and shoulders. Since I knew it would do no good to ask who _she_ went to cotillion with, who _she_ danced with, who she wowed with this lovely piece of craftsmanship, I had instead inquired as to who had made it.

"Erickson Beamon," she answered, while adjusting the clasp so it also sat just right between my shoulders.

Tristan had picked me up in a rented Aston-Martin and we had joked about my dress expanding and devouring the car before we even made it to the ballroom. I had impressed the board members of the ball's prestigious charity, amazed them with my flawless dance skills, and smiled politely at Sophie from where she danced nearby with her vastly inferior escort. It had been a charmed evening, all fairy lights and fine wine, my mother's smiling face beaming at me like a lighthouse beacon from the haze of a foggy crowd.

At this cotillion, I was not going to be the belle of the ball, nor was there anyone to see me off and promise to take plenty of pictures from her perch at the proud parents' table. My escort was a rather frivolous trophy, the evidence of my one real victory over Constance Billard's chosen queen bee; my dress was not feather white but periwinkle blue, and though it worked as a nice winter contrast against my now ivory skin, and my hair extensions served to give beautiful body to my Audrey Hepburn inspired up-do, I felt like a little girl digging through her mother's closet and playing dress up in too-big shoes.

We didn't speak to each other the entire ride, but it was an odd sort of amiable silence. Maverick leaned his head back against his headrest and closed his eyes to think—of what, I had no idea. Perhaps he was contemplating the many things he would rather be doing than taking me to an uppity society ball, or maybe he was simply letting his thoughts idly wander to less pressing matters. I wished I had the ability to do that, to forget the pounding of my heart as the hotel came into sight, to put aside the adrenaline that rushed like a flood through my veins when I realized my godmother was either inside or soon to be inside.

And when I asked her about Chuck Bass, she would not shake her head with sad eyes and tell me to 'ask your mother'. She would pull me aside, to some dim, quiet room away from the festivities, and ask what I wanted to know. Then, she would tell me everything honestly, with that open and sincere face of hers, and my now sepia-toned world would bloom into technicolor.

I felt a fluttering of happiness when Maverick failed to hold the front door open for me—something in me was starting to like that about him, in some warped and very unfeminine way; at least he had a conviction that he stuck to steadfastly, no matter how rude and insensitive it was. Then again, I had two hands and was perfectly capable of touching a door handle now and then. My arms were not broken, nor was I a swooning invalid, plus it allowed me to move between the two fairy-lit trees and into the hotel's lobby at my own pace.

We followed a steady stream of debutantes back to the ballroom entrance, through which I could clearly see an explosion of pure white and crisp champagne. The committee members were overseeing last second details and standing in clumps along the grand staircase where we would be presented to society. I spotted Cedric at the foot of the stairs in a nice, custom-made tuxedo, with his camera secured around his neck by a fine silky strap, and rolled my eyes good-naturedly when he snapped several candid photographs of Maverick and me.

"I can't believe they let you in here," I teased, adjusting my hair so that my bangs fell correctly over my eyebrows.

"I never miss a party!" All I saw of his face was the broad, white-toothed smile beneath his camera as another flash went off.

Scarlett, who stood near the middle of the stairs with her long red hair falling in waves down the back of her figure-skimming emerald green dress, caught sight of me and my escort immediately hurried down the stairs in her stiletto heels to greet us.

"Maverick!" Rather than embracing him or giving him a kiss on the cheek like I had often seen her do, she eyed him up and down with a peculiar look on her face. "I can't believe you actually dressed up. You _actually_ came in tails. Cedric, please, hurry and take a picture before Maverick Sparks re-inhabits his body!"

Maverick stared evenly at her and put his hands in his pockets. "Ha ha, Scar. As if Cedric would –"

But, before he could protest, our resident paparazzo snapped a rapid succession of full body shots that I dearly hoped he would make copies of. Not because Maverick looked particularly striking in his clean-cut black suit and midnight blue tie and matching cummerbund, or because I found it absolutely charming how cavalier he was about the state of his perfectly messy hair, or even because I found the slightly superior grin on his face highly attractive—he thought he was above all the pomp and circumstance, yet he had been cajoled into indulging in it by some very mild flirting. I could identify with a good, healthy superiority complex.

When Teddy joined us at the foot of the staircase, I immediately tried to mentally inquire as to our shared godmother's presence, but he seemed to be too focused on his date to pay much mind to me. I couldn't feel annoyed with him, however, considering he had already technically upheld the end of his bargain and I had _officially_ upheld the end of mine, and therefore we owed nothing to each other anymore. Not as far as he knew, anyway.

"Teddy?" I bit my lip when he tore his eyes away from Scarlett and raised his eyebrows at me. "Can we talk? Just for a second."

He frowned and looked around at the last streams of people taking their places in the lineup. "Right now?"

I nodded and gestured towards a little alcove beneath the stairs. He cast an apologetic look at Scarlett, who merely shrugged and smiled sweetly at him, which made him freeze in his tracks and sent his jaw scraping the glistening marble floor, which forced me to grab him by the crook of his elbow and forcibly drag him into the shadows.

"Teddy," I started more than a little hesitantly, feeling a nervous sting pricking the back of my neck. It warned me not to continue, as I had not planned to utter my theory aloud or even think about it too hard until I saw Serena and could beg her to assure me that I was not going crazy, but if it _was_ true then Teddy had the right to be forewarned. "I...I re-read Blair's diary, and I think I know who my mother is."

"You do?" I saw in his expression the part of him that reminded me of me, the little flame in the back of his eyes that craved intrigue and excitement. He thought he had an inkling as to what I was about to tell him, but I knew as soon as it came out of my mouth that he had not been prepared to hear it.

"She's _your_ mother."

"That's impossible," he shivered as if we were caught in a strong, frigid wind. "My mother died when she gave birth to me. She was –"

"Misty Bass was a lovely woman," I interjected, keen that he didn't think I was dishonoring her name. "But she is not your mother."

He kept his eyes on me, but something died behind them as he choked for a breath. "Shut up, Elle, I mean it. Don't say another w –"

"No, s'il te plait, listen to me." I grabbed his arms to keep him in place, but it was unnecessary. He was rooted to the spot. "I re-read the diary and I thought about it all night, and it all makes sense if you just step back and think objectively. Chuck Bass married Blair Waldorf on December 27th, 2010, and we were both born on June 15th, 2011. I know from Gossip Girl's website that they were dating in September of 2010, which has to be around the time we were both conceived, and –"

"Stop."

He did not yell or lash out or insult me or even shove me off of him. Teddy just sighed and looked caught under a terrible weight. Naturally, I ignored his request and took the contemplative silence as a cue to continue blathering on, despite the wrinkle it put between his eyebrows and the tense way his lips curled up at the edges and twitched uncontrollably along with the tic in his jaw. I had to give him the information, and damn the consequences.

"And it all adds up. I did a little digging, and those newspaper articles you found never said that Misty Bass married _Charles_ Bass. Just the CEO of Bass Industries, which could mean she married your grandfather Bart and that the woman you've been thinking gave birth to you is really your grandmother!"

Teddy grit his teeth together and shook his head. "My dad _told me_ that she died in childbirth."

"Did he tell you your mother died in childbirth?" I clenched my fingers tighter around his arms. "Or that _Misty Bass_ died in childbirth?"

"I –" His voice caught over the following word, and only then did he look away. "The letter she wrote me –"

It was my turn to shake my head in contradiction.

"The letter she wrote to 'Charlie'? Teddy..." I reached into my clutch and removed the pages I had chosen to rip out of Blair's diary the night he had shown me that very letter. They each described her days recovering in the hospital after 'Charlie' was born, all of them were signed _Blair Bass_, and the majority of them showcased quite clearly her love of and reliance on Chuck Bass. "Read these, when you get a chance. Just do not say you will not believe me until you read these, all right?"

I pressed them into his hands as a string quartet began to play soft music to accompany the presentations. When he refused to open his palms and receive the papers, I stuffed them into his pockets, shot him one last imploring look, and dashed to the stairs to get in line across from Maverick, who was looking quite bored and above it all on a lower step.

Lily smiled at the assemblage from her perch on the landing and moved to stand in its center behind the podium, but I could not see the entire board around her due to my hampered height and the distressing number of tall Amazon women on the steps above me.

Part of me didn't know what I would do if I saw Serena there—would I break apart from the line and rush up to her to beg her to come somewhere private with me for a chat? Would I smile congenially and act like nothing was amiss? Or would my brain dry up and forget everything I had obsessed over and wanted to ask her?

"Welcome, everyone, to this year's Annual Dispensary Cotillion and Debutante Ball."

A smattering of polite applause rose from the floor behind us and from the upper galleries. I scanned that crowd to see if perhaps my godmother was simply watching the festivities out of the spotlight, but all I managed to do was spot a lithe, dark-haired girl in cream silk waving emphatically at Maverick, who winked roguishly back at her and grinned an _honest_ smile I had not seen on his face before then.

I vaguely heard Saffron's name called along with that of her escort, but I refused to acknowledge her existence. The fact that Lily seemed to 'accidentally' break into a rather loud coughing fit when she read out the Queen Bee's shallow future plans made me feel a whole lot better about my social disgrace, and my mood soared even higher when the applause at her pronouncement was lukewarm at best.

Her half-sister received a much warmer reception, but it was the reading of her escort's name that shot a thrill up my spine.

"...escorted by Theodore Harold Bass..."

I almost forgot how to move my feet to alight the next step.

Before I could reflect too much on that revelation, which served to further confirm my shoddily-compiled evidence, it seemed like some higher being pressed a fast-forward button on the rest of the presentations, and I found myself standing at the top of the heap, my jewelry glittering perfectly on my throat, my dress fitting perfectly over my figure, as Lily van der Woodsen...Humphrey introduced me to Manhattan society. Many of the older families there had never seen or heard of me, so my list of achievements abroad immediately set their seasoned tongues wagging; the fact that I bore the surname _Waldorf_ was no small matter either, and for the first time in a long time, I remembered to smile and carry myself like someone deserving that title.

I slid my arm through Maverick's and we joined the others in the ballroom, which was a beautiful wonderland of expensive imported flowers, one-of-a-kind silky Egyptian cotton linens, and soft romantic lighting. I could not see anyone in the style of dress I expected from Serena, nor could I make out her signature long waves of blonde hair in the thick of the uptight crowd; I did see Aunt Jenny's blonde curls at a table near the center of the onlookers, and though she was resplendent in pale pink and ivory, I saw the red rims around her carefully made up eyes.

Nate was across the room with a group of men I assumed were business colleagues or college friends. Lex was nowhere to be seem—I assumed he was out painting the town blue with Julian—and Lux was holding court with a few other freshmen minions in the back of the room. Maverick and I moved to a table near where Aunt Jenny sat making small talk over sparkling champagne, and were joined before long by Scarlett, Teddy, and a few other people who did not prescribe to _The Saffron Kennedy Show._

The point of the four-course meal was to showcase the deportment and gentility the debutantes had learned from weeks of etiquette classes. I sat up straight in my chair and took tiny bites, not because I was aiming to impress any of the hawk-eyed committee members, but because I was not hungry and the high position gave me a better view of our fellow diners. Either Serena had not yet arrived, or she was hiding very well among her peers.

When the music changed to a stirring waltz and we gathered on the dance floor to entertain the parents and other guests, I concentrated more on glancing periodically over Maverick's broad shoulders to search for a pair of navy blue eyes or a sunny smile twinkling at me from amidst a haze of strangers. Where _was _she? I saw Eric near his mother, sharing a cup of wine with Colin, and chuckling over something or other, but where was his sister? He had _promised me_ she would be at the debutante ball...

As we turned in endless circles for the Viennese waltz, I did my best to keep an eye out. That is when it happened.

A dark figure in the middle of the room, his chocolate brown hair falling over his narrowed brow and dark shadowed eyes. He stood with his hands in his trouser pockets, and his eyes bore into mine like they could see through tissue, flesh, and bone, and into the core of my very soul. I gasped all at once and accidentally dug my spiked heel into Maverick's foot.

We broke the formation rather spectacularly, while he drew his mouth into a straight, thin line to pretend like he wasn't in excruciating pain, and I whirled around with his arms still around me to inspect the place where I had seen that familiar face staring so intensely at me. But, when I stood still and had time to gaze unhindered, there was no on there. Just an old married couple watching the two of us with slightly concerned looks on their lined, weathered faces.

Maverick let out an annoyed grunt, turned me back around, and tried to get us back in the rhythm with everyone else. I heard Saffron's chirpy laugh somewhere behind us, but tried to ignore it as I had studiously refused to notice her silly dress, ugly hairdo, and completely ill-coordinated Jimmy Choos.

_Serena_. I tried to remind myself to focus on the task at hand. _You have to find Serena._

But that dark face would not leave me alone. When the music drew to a close and Maverick was able to take a step back and massage his foot with an undignified look of annoyance on his altogether quite naturally and unrepentantly handsome face, I caught my breath and wondered if perhaps I had imagined him—he couldn't possibly be in the same room as me? It was just out of the question. He was a world away, far away, far away from me and my world and entirely removed from everything I knew and was. To have him so close and staring at me like that as if he knew precisely who I was made me uncomfortable. I realized that perhaps I was playing the part of a pawn in a very complicated chess game when all along I had been pretending to be the queen.

"I suppose you'll want to keep dancing."

Now that the rehearsed waltzes were over with, we were free to enjoy the company of other partners, or retire to dinner tables to socialize with other guests, but all I was concerned about was a foggy memory and an all-consuming quest that I was starting to imagine might _actually_ consume me until it burned the charred remains and there was nothing left.

"No, thank you." I leaned up, putting my hands on his shoulders to support myself, and planted a kiss on his cheek.

Then I excused myself into another room, where I hoped my godmother might be relaxing amidst less stuffy companions.

As I crossed the threshold, I felt someone right behind me. Diesel Fuel For Life invaded my nostrils, pricking the invisible hairs on my forearms, and tensing my muscles underneath my increasingly clammy skin. How much more could I be expected to take on a night that was _meant_ for frivolity and mindless dancing?

"Here she is," I heard that horrifying high-pitched faux baby voice and looked around to see Saffron smirking at me with improved vindictiveness. "Though I can't imagine what you want with her."

And there he was, all at once. The figure that haunted fevered nightmares, who intruded on my self-imposed exile with unwelcome phone calls and invaded my memories with his soft touches, his gentle caresses, his firm insistence that he held me in the utmost regard. I was not ready to see him, not ready to hate him as vehemently as I so dearly wanted to for all the sins he had committed against me; nor was I ready to fully face up to the fact that I had not been entirely innocent and probably deserved much worse than the punishment I had earned.

I found it more than a little disturbing how _right_ his long fingers felt wrapped around the top of my bare arm. As if he had never pressed flesh to flesh hard enough to stain a royal bruise on fearful white porcelain; as if he had only ever cradled and gently caressed and cherished and left his mark in breadcrumb trails of sweet, possessive kisses.

When he turned me around to face him, it was as if we were back on Avenue Henri Martin in scarves and fashionably upturned hats. When he ran his thumb across my lower lip, I did not shudder or protest as I should have—as I had every right to do; it was as if we were on our couch in Blair Waldorf's living room, or turning around and around in hot water inside the claw-foot tub in my private bathroom. When his eyes swept up and down my body, that is just how naked I felt; raw and unprotected and unable to feel ashamed, whether or not that was the appropriate emotion.

I just stared, somehow unsurprised that he had found his way across the sea to me. Had a little part of me been waiting for him to be around every corner? Had it started before his calls or after? Would a little part of me always feel like it could forgive him, could still want him, could still try to live up to everything he said he wanted?

"Tristan?" It was scarcely more than a dreamy whisper.

The smirk on Saffron's face told me that, somehow, she was instrumental in his presence. I had not paid attention to her presentation, but perhaps I should have—perhaps then I would have seen him looking dashing in white tie, the tails of his jacket sweeping the backs of his barely ticklish knees.

Perhaps I would have been better prepared for the dent his being there put in my plan.

His lips parted wolfishly over sharp, pearly white teeth, and his fingers suddenly stiffened and tried to puncture my skin.

"Bonjour, ma petite." His breath spread hot over my face and stirred the little hairs on the back of my neck. "_I've come to collect._"

Sophie, the rightful winner of our disastrous bet, had chosen the boy I was to lose my virginity to. Not a lowlife member of some unimportant school club, or her lecherous father or one of her unappealing brothers, or a stranger from a club, not even an older sort of clueless man I would need to seduce and maneuver into my bed. She had selected the one person it would demolish me to sleep with, the one person who had the power to send me melting to my knees at a single word, _the same person_ she had won fair and square and was graciously 'letting me' borrow for an evening.

_She_ was the munificent and benevolent ruler, and I was the petty pauper at her feet.

"H_ow did you find me here?_" It was all I could manage to choke out, other than heavy, fearful breaths, or shocked little gasps.

Tristan Marchand was my every dream realized in one tall, dark, handsome, suave, worldly, filthy rich, tortured artist soul with the chiseled face of every prince charming I had ever read about as a child. He was also a predator, with glinting eyes and sharp, wolfish teeth, which he showed me with his dark and daunting scowl and the way he suddenly shoved me hard against the wall the way he had done in the music room that fateful day.

"_It's not nice to promise something and then back out on the deal,_" he whispered against my cheek, his hot breath a scorching piece of metal on my flesh. "_You owe her your virginity, and I'm here to take it._" When I tried to dig my heel into the middle of his foot, as I had unintentionally done to Maverick during our Viennese waltz, he shook me hard enough to make me dizzy, but not enough to draw any unwanted attention to our squabble. "_By force, if necessary_."

Did no one see us? I knew Saffron was standing nearby with a self-satisfied smile on her smug whoreish face, but did no one else see that I could not possibly escape from the much larger person bruising me with his touch and his eyes and his words and his lips when they descended on mine with all the force of a bullet train. I cried out into his mouth for someone to get him off of me, but for the second time in my life, it only added fuel to his fire. His tongue clashed against my resisting one and though I tried to bite it, he darted it back behind his own teeth so that my jaw ached from the internal collision.

"Get _off_ of me, Tristan!" I shouted, pushing against his stone firm chest.

He merely pressed closer and taunted me with his lovely eyes. "_In ten minutes you'll be screaming 'get me off, Tristan!' instead._"

Just as I started to lose all faith that anyone would come to my aid, I heard Teddy's voice shout "Hey!" somewhere from my left, and then there were heavy footsteps, and then someone (a distinguished knight come to rescue the helpless princess from the evil dragon) heaved him away from me by the collar of his shirt. I was able to slap at Tristan's wandering hands as hard as I could before he was yanked out of reach and I stumbled back into the paneled wall, my hair in shambles around my face and my lipstick smeared horribly across my mouth.

The dark figure I had seen in the crowd earlier had my attacker pinned against the opposite wall and he growled from the pits of his chest.

"Stay the hell away from my daughter."


	33. An Interlude: I'm Chuck Bass

**A/N:** Lyrics are from _Say (All I Need)_ by OneRepublic.

Thanks to everyone, for your awesome reviews! I felt a bit detached from things while writing this chapter, and as a result, Chuck might seem a bit disconnected and not really emotionally invested in events. The road his life has taken has made him rather analytical and quite a _bit_ detached, so I haven't gone back to try and 'remedy' this tone. I think it fits. =]

You were all quite insistent that I update quick or you would die or implode, and as I don't want to be held accountable for lawsuits or any mysterious and violent deaths... Enjoy this present from me to you, a whole chapter full of CHUCK.

"_Do you know where your love is? Do you think that you lost it?  
You felt it so strong, but nothing's turned out how you wanted."_

**CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE**_  
I'm Chuck Bass_

He sat at the desk in his hotel room, which he had turned to face away from the sprawling view of glittering Tokyo beneath him.

If he stared diligently enough at spreadsheets, and diagrams next to graphs and pie charts, and re-read enough half-baked business proposals slapped together by caffeine-deprived and inexperienced interns on the instructions of superiors who prized their golf swing above any heavy lifting, then he could pretend the noise from the streets below was New York and that the loud shouts were yelled in English and that he was in his own office with a glass of his own Scotch and his own music numbing his brain into a task-oriented stupor.

And the neon lights that painted their reflections on his window and cast his work in an ever-changing rainbow glow were the distant ghosts of Times Square at midnight.

Chuck rested his forehead against his fist and tried his time-honored method of beating the oncoming headache away through sheer brute force.

When that failed and he realized he was out of pain relievers, he slammed his palm against the mahogany wood and sighed. _I love my job_, he told himself forcefully, blinking his exhausted eyes a few times to clear his vision. Then, he returned to the glowing LCD of his laptop and realized he had no idea what he had been reading for the past forty five minutes. _I love my job_. _I just hate the work sometimes._

When he drummed his fingers on the stack of untouched papers still waiting to be perused, he shot them a venomous glare. _All the time._

He had been in Japan for several months, separated from the everyday office politics that plagued him in Manhattan. He was free from the incompetent underlings, the inefficient secretaries, the money-grubbing assistants that had a tendency to cook the books if he did not keep a close eye on them. Bass Industries was everything his father had built over a lifetime of ingenuity and elbow grease, and under his care the corporate infrastructure had undergone a fair amount of deterioration. He was currently in the process of systematically laying off and promptly firing all those he considered to be a hindrance to the company's future, all the while taking a loathed pacifistic approach to avoid stepping all over the board.

What he really wanted was the omnipotent ability to systematically lay off and promptly fire the entire _board_, but he had Lily's assurance that they would respond less than enthusiastically to that suggestion. So, he invented excuses to stay abroad, scheduled meetings with conglomerates he had no real interest in, eyed a few skyscraping hotels and feigned a keen curiosity, when in all reality he was really using the trip as an excuse to take a much needed vacation.

The clock flashed the time from his stand-in bedside table.

3:01 AM.

In New York City, the clock had only just struck 2 PM the previous day.

In Paris, it was 8 in the evening.

Chuck scrubbed his hands over his face and let them run through his still mostly styled hair. It was still thick and dark brown, but now that he was getting nearer and nearer to 40, he could _feel_ the gray hairs pushing up through his scalp and staking their claim all over the place; part of him wanted to think it would look distinguished, and the other part wanted to sue for mental damages.

When he looked back up and realized it was 3:07 in the morning, he decided to shut off his computer and roll onto the luxurious king size bed for another night of staring at the ceiling and letting digital numbers be the flickering light that lulled him to sleep. He had become accustomed to the lack of warmth at his side, but the memory of the last person to take that place curled up against him was as fresh as it had been on the day she left him.

Just as he was about to drift into a very nice dream about the backseat of a sleek black limo, his cell phone buzzed in his pocket.

This was unusual, because all business calls were automatically deferred to his business phone, which was lying dormant atop his now quiet laptop and had not rung for several days. The only people who contacted his personal cell were his family and close friends, and all of them knew exactly where he was and that they could be interrupting either a good, hard sleep or a hard, long slog and none of them would _ever_ call unless it was an emergency.

Frowning, Chuck pulled the phone from his front pocket and lifted it to eye level to inspect the number. It was unfamiliar to his quick memory, and it was not accompanied by a name or picture, so he brushed it off as an unfortunate case of mistaken identity. Until, of course, it fell silent only to ring again thirty second later.

The same number danced across the screen.

And, because he figured it could very possibly be someone he knew on a new phone or on a payphone (as unlikely a scenario as that might have seemed to him at one time, several rather unfortunate circumstances had led him to believe that payphones might just be one public service he didn't have to pretend didn't exist), and whoever they were might be in trouble and need his expertise bailing them out.

So, he answered.

"Bass here."

There was no audible reply, just silence from the other end. His thoughts quickly jumped to some kind of personal blackmail or ransom about to be read to him through a voice changer, or perhaps to the steady breathing of some nameless and jilted former employee who was about to vow to seek revenge on Chuck Bass and the evil corporation he headed. After spending more than half his life running Bass Industries, he had developed a habit of jumping to the worst, most outlandish conclusion, which often served to soften the blow for the real problem.

"Hello?" He tried again. When he still received no answer, he sat up on the edge of the bed and wondered if maybe he needed to switch cell phone companies. "Hello?"

When moving around the room like an insomniac who had imagined the phone vibrating against his thigh did not yield any crystal clear results, Chuck rolled his eyes to the heavens and ran his thumb across his bottom lip to wipe away the moisture his irritated darting tongue had left behind.

"Wonderful doing business with you."

He pressed his thumb to the _end_ button when one breathless whisper stopped him.

"Chuck."

Chuck Bass had not heard that voice in almost seventeen years, but there was no mistaking it. It was every bit as fragile as it had been the last time she had spoken to him, but there was deepness in its tone, a maturity that no doubt reflected in his own voice in ways even he could not hear. He had heard her breathe that name in all sorts of ways at all sorts of volumes; anger, irritation, desire, lust, love, admiration, hatred, loud, soft, raspy, deep, soft, light, cheerful, depressed, longing... the full gamut of emotions had been expressed to him through just that one syllable from between her full lips, which he imagined were parted in anticipation of his response.

"...Blair?"

"It's Blair," she confirmed, but he already knew. Of course it was Blair. No one else could make him feel so insipidly unimportant and desperately needed all at once. "Chuck? Are you still there? Chuck?"

He closed his eyes and breathed deep through his nostrils. He had been waiting for that phone call to happen for what seemed like much _longer_ than less than half his life, and now that it had and she had uttered his name three times and had said hers, and had called _him_ and hadn't hung up, Chuck found he wasn't at all ready. What was wrong? She couldn't have... Well, he knew there was no way she had decided to do what he had told her she someday would, because in that case she would have appeared to him in person, so he could run his fingers through that chocolate brown hair and pull her into the kiss of her life and see the determination of her decision burning in her eyes.

But a phone call was not _nothing_, so he felt his fingers grasp at his cell as if grasping for her not to disconnect the line.

"I'm here," he reassured her. Then, because he found he could not stop himself once he started, he muttered "I'm always here."

Whether she heard him or not, she pressed forward, a new anxiety in her whisper that informed him her eyebrows were puckered together and that a needy pout had formed which extended not just around her lips but from behind her eyes and even to the quivering of her little chin.

"Chuck, I'm calling because I need you to do something for me. If you don't mi—"

"I'll do it," Chuck swore without thinking. If she wanted him to get on a jet and fly to Paris to be with her that night, or whether she was calling to officially put an end to the waiting game they were both playing and leave him to a lifetime of hopeless, meaningless days and nights, or if she just wanted someone to deliver chocolates to a friend of hers in Budapest, he would do it for her in a heartbeat. It was a sad but true fact that after sixteen years of divorce, Chuck Bass was utterly and completely under her spell. "What is it?"

He heard Blair suck in a breath as if to gain strength.

"Your daughter is in New York."

He understood why she had needed that pause. All his breath seemed to leave his body in an instant.

"I need you to go there," she continued, after clearing her throat. She spoke much more resolutely. It was like they were seventeen again, and she was calling him up to send him on a seek-and-destroy reconnaissance mission to take down some handmaiden who had displeased her. He reached for the suitcase before she even finished her request and started piling things into it. "I need you to go there and explain things to her."

Chuck felt dizzy as he shoved his laptop into its carrier with the rest of his business luggage and checked drawers for any forgotten items, though the contents of his closet completely eluded him as he went into the bathroom and grabbed everything within reach, including the complimentary soap and a fluffy golden robe. "She's where?"

"She's in New York," Blair repeated slowly. "With Nate."

"Right now?" The shock from hearing her called _his daughter_ and hearing that she was in his world with his friends and that Blair wanted him to go see her and _explain things to her_ sent his brain into overdrive even as it shut down all of his common sense functions.

Blair sounded a bit more like her old self when she snapped at him. "Yes, Chuck, right now. I'm sure she's been snooping around and I—" The petulant pout faded from her voice and it melted into a sad, nostalgic sort of tuneless melody. "I just want someone to tell her the truth, and it can't be me, so it has to be you."

His fingers lingered on the clasp of his suitcase and Chuck waited for her to collect herself.

"Can you do that for me?" she finally asked, reverting back to her original frail and winded sigh.

"Of course," He checked the watch on his wrist and glanced at the business phone clutched in his free hand. "I'll fly out tonight."

And then, any trace of her reserve vanished, and Blair sniffled. It was very soft, faint enough to be mistaken for a shuffling of bed sheets or a rustling of expensive finery, but he had seen her cry and held her more than once when she did so, and his ears were trained specifically to pick up her every movement, continents away from him or not.

"She's going to cotillion," she managed to choke out. "Would you...would you mind calling me and telling me how she looks?"

Chuck left the room key on the chest of drawers and let the hotel room door slam behind him. "I'm sure she looks like a Waldorf."

"No," Blair broke through her melancholy and her throat tweeted out an involuntary laugh. "She looks like a Bass."

The first time he saw Eleanor Misty Bass, she was small enough to fit comfortably in the palms of his hands. He thought of her often, and when he did, it was always of the newborn infant with wide blue eyes that faded to brown one day when no one was paying attention, the little baby girl with the tuft of dark hair that curled upwards out of the top of her head and which Blair kept pushed back with stylish silk headbands. His daughter was forever in designer onesies and cuddling with Teddy in their shared crib—they had bought two and even had two nurseries set up, but the twins hated to be separated, so they both slept in the same crib at the foot of the bed in the master bedroom.

Teddy had once been Charlie, but Ellie had always been Ellie.

He knew, somewhere in the back of his mind, that as the years passed she grew older. She acquired more curly tufts of hair, her eyes didn't look quite so large and rounded on her chubby little face, and she probably wore an array of pretty little dresses with flowery headbands and patent leather shoes. She learned to talk and read and walk and say 'mine' all without him to supervise her and fill her bedroom with as many dolls, ponies, and pieces of jewelry she wanted. She grew taller and acquired distinctive interests, started going to school and discovered which subjects she liked best, met friends and enemies and probably had a line of boys stretching around the block for just a chance to get a look at her.

She was sixteen. He couldn't believe it.

The last time he had seen her, she had scarcely been 6 months old. She had cooed and giggled when he idly tickled her stomach, but he had felt oddly detached from her; as if without Blair there to sit next to him and perfect the little bows on her dress, Ellie did not belong to him. But Blair had left him with the twins to live in France with her father and try to pull herself back together. Chuck had understood, had supported her, had even signed the divorce papers when she had sent them to him, but he had never—not for one moment—believed that any of that meant they were over.

He had done something he had never done before, not even when they had stood at the altar and muttered their hurried vows to each other. Chuck Bass had sworn on more than divine powers or on the witness of their friends and family, he had made a vow on his very life that he would be waiting for her when she came back to him.

Which she would. It was only a matter of time.

Some nights, when the sting of loneliness became so unbearable that he had been tempted to pick up the phone and demand she get her shapely, stubborn ass on a plane that instant and let him help her, he had kicked himself for that promise. What had he been thinking? He had made a lifelong commitment to her before, sure, and that had been the hardest thing he had ever done—as much as he loved her and as often as he reminded her of it with those eight letters and pretty trinkets, giving her the rest of his life was a bit daunting.

And, anthropologically speaking, entirely pointless. Or so he had learned from countless 1 AM reruns of _Bones_.

But something had happened the moment he saw those twins emerge and blink confusedly at the bright and loud world after enduring hours and hours of sheer hell. Something had rendered him deaf to the silence in the world, and he had just seen those little pink bundles of flesh and bone that they had made together, and he realized that they were now forever linked, no matter what happened to them or their hearts. Teddy had not cried, and Ellie had been too small, but all he had known in that moment of stillness was peace and knowledge that they were perfect.

They were theirs.

And the wedding vows had made sense.

The weeks after that had been even worse than the delivery. Charlie, as they had called him all throughout the pregnancy, was rechristened Teddy upon an insipid observation from Serena; in all honesty, it had been a fruitless effort on Chuck's part to bring a smile to Blair's ashen face. He had sat at her bedside, stroked her dry hair, ran his fingers over the trenches in her cracked lips, had kissed the platinum band on her left hand and reassured her with a cold indifference that it would all "work out".

He couldn't let himself feel anything, because when he did, he would realize that his children were dying.

Teddy had spent his first days in the NICU, separated from his sister, who had stabilized after quick action by the team of specialized doctors Chuck had flown to New York, and been allowed to sleep in Blair's hospital room after a few preliminary evenings in the nursery. But she had been oddly sullen, crying only for milk and diaper changes. He stared at the other babies writhing around in their prams, slumbering a lot, but letting their bright eyes dart curiously around the yellow room; Ellie's eyes stared blankly through metal bars at her mother, who was slowly wasting away through no fault of her own.

He remembered quite clearly that they had been attending Sunday brunch at her favorite restaurant with Lily and his step-siblings and their significant others, when Blair had complained of discomfort and returned from the bathroom horror struck after discovering blood on her La Perlas.

A specialist had examined her thirteen minutes later and informed them that she had a condition known as placenta praevia, and gone on to confuse them by calling it an obstetric complication in which the placenta attached to the uterine wall close to or covering the cervix and was the cause of her antepartum hemorrhage.

"Women with large placentae from twins are at higher risk," he had informed them when Blair had asked under a thin veil of calm whether or not anything she had done in the past could have possibly caused the condition. It wasn't her fault. It had just happened.

He, of course, had struggled for a long time with the realization that if his wife tried to carry the babies to term, there was every chance in the world—not _some_ chance, or the ghost of a chance, or a remote chance, but _every chance_—that she would die. The babies might live, if they were lucky, but it was very likely that she would lose too much blood and die in the delivery room.

_Just like his mother_.

When word got out, the rumors spread like they always did, like wildfire, throughout the Upper East Side. They called it the Bass curse. He fired a few of the whisperers and threatened petty lawsuits against others, before Blair had intervened by finally smiling and telling him that they were just jealous because they had ever only had _one _baby at a time. Besides, bad things only ever came in threes, and they were having two; she rubbed his shoulders and kissed his neck and told him that she wasn't going to die because she refused to allow him the honor of blaming himself for it.

And, in the end, no one died. Teddy recovered when they exhausted all other options and allowed his twin sister to cuddle with him in his pram while Chuck and Blair tried to decide whether or not to let their baby boy out of his misery. The twins had held onto each other like survivors of a tragedy clinging to a stray piece of debris, and in one of those medical mysteries that baffle scientists and renew doctors' hope in the survival of the human spirit, Teddy and Elle had each come alive.

But the aftermath.

That had driven Blair to leave him, to say that she couldn't do it anymore and she wasn't being fair to any of them. He could take care of the babies, she told him, wiping away a tear as she clutched her suitcases in her hands and did that thing where her eyes didn't match her mouth. She knew how much they meant to him and she would never take them away from him because they would take care of him even though she could not. They were his, forever and until after the day the world ended.

After months of waiting for her to come to her senses and slowly realizing that she was in classic Stubborn Blair mode and _sense_ was quite obviously the farthest thing from her thoughts, Chuck had decided that she wasn't allowed to feel worthless and unworthy all the way on the other side of the Atlantic. So he had kissed Elle's nose and tickled her stomach as she babbled nonsense sounds, handed her over to Dorota, and sent them both to France in his private jet with his most trusted pilot.

Teddy had screamed and wailed for his sister for countless nights until he couldn't cry anymore. And then the scars had healed over.

He had always remembered her as an ageless infant, but the intelligent part of his brain knew she was a young woman. The only thing that could not and would not register with him as he sat in his usual seat aboard the Bass Industries plane was that she looked anything like him; Chuck had decided years ago that she was a perfect carbon copy of her beautiful mother and that she would never have to strain under the burden of being related to him the way Teddy did.

Chuck swirled the glass of Scotch in his right hand and stared at the line of debutantes. _"I'm sure she looks like a Waldorf."_

"_No,"_ Blair's voice broke through his melancholy and his throat tensed and worked to hold down his emotions. _"She looks like a Bass."_

And she did look like a Bass, standing at the top of the stairs in light blue, but Lily announced her as Eleanor Misty _Waldorf_, and he wanted to put a stop to the whole masquerade and set the world straight. She was his little girl, beautiful and small and just like her mother, and she was a _Bass_. Couldn't they see it? She practically screamed it, from the way she held her chin aloft and squared her shoulders back to balance her easy, elegant posture as she strolled regally to the dance floor on the arm of...

Maverick Sparks?

He would definitely be talking to her about _that_ decision.

She was only sixteen, after all. There was no need for her to entertain members of the opposite sex for another three to thirty years.

He watched her dance and she was flawless, even in the arms of such an unsuitable partner. She may not have been the lead debutante like that detestable peroxide blonde girl in the low-cut white dress Lily had amusingly struggled not to glare disapprovingly at (or kick down the stairs, Chuck suspected), but she was easily the most graceful, enchanting person in the room, aside from himself. Her movements were sure and swift and well-practiced, but when he looked at her sharply defined face and noticed her dark eyes daring around like they had done so proficiently from her playpen, he couldn't help but sweep the crowd for whatever she was searching for.

All he could see were the memories of times past—a dark-haired girl in a cloudy white ball gown, with shimmering silver details and a large bow, decorated only with the diamond necklace he had given her for her seventeenth birthday, an ill-conceived plot gone devastatingly awry, a reunion that tore his heart out, a dance that ended too soon. Chuck felt like he lived too much of life in the past, but part of him couldn't help but think that—even with all its heartaches and drama and gossip and back-stabbing—it was a better time.

When his gaze returned to the place Ellie had been twirling, she was gone and Teddy was mysteriously in her place. It jarred him for a second, to remember that they were twins and, of course, she would look somewhat like him. Their noses weren't exactly the same, and neither was the shape of their foreheads, nor the intricacies of their eyebrows or the exact shape of their jaws, but their eyes were the same shape under the same brow, and their mouths tensed in the same way when things weren't going the way they had intended.

That's when he realized his son was looking quite intently at something with a concerned expression that tore his focus from the redheaded girl in his embrace. A sort of thrill rushed through Chuck and he knocked back his Scotch in anticipation of whatever it was for. Had the two of them already met each other? It was impossible for them to have avoided it. Lex was his best friend and she was staying in Nate's townhouse... and even though he didn't know the details as to why she was in Manhattan and not back in Paris in the 16th arrondissement where she belonged, he knew it wasn't because she wanted to broaden her educational horizons.

She must have grown curious. It should have been expected, considering who she came from.

Teddy pulled away from his date and began walking swiftly towards an alcove that led to an adjacent room meant for more intimate socializing on plush leather couches in dim, flickering light, and when Chuck moved to follow him, the whole disturbing scene came into alarmingly clear focus. First, he saw the back of the blonde's head, then over her shoulder there was a tall, dark boy with his large hands wrapped firmly around the delicate elbows he knew belonged to his little girl.

At first, he thought it was Maverick Sparks, and his footsteps were charged with years-old revenge. Then, he took a closer look, and realized the suit was different, the physicality was different, and not least of all, the expression on Ellie's face was a dangerous cocktail of fear, shock, and dread.

That's when he broke into a run.

He would pull the creep away from her and let security handle him, and then he would face the daunting task of explaining everything to his clueless children. She might not recognize him for what he was, at first, but at least she would know intrinsically that he was around to protect her from anyone who meant to do her harm. It's what nature had fashioned him to do from his first moment with them in the delivery room.

"Get _off_ me, Tristan!" she was struggling to get away, and Chuck could tell from the relentless grip 'Tristan' had on her arms that she would gain some nasty bruises for the effort.

The boy spoke low, in French, but he didn't need to be fluent in the language to guess at what he was whispering to her. He was sure that at some party a long time ago, he had trapped some helpless girl in a dark corner and whispered something equally dangerous and (as Blair would have said at the time) heinous in her impressionable ears. It didn't matter to Chuck, really, what he had said; all that mattered was the whimper it inspired to rise from Ellie's throat and when he saw her eyes flutter closed in faithless defeat, he pressed forward.

"Hey!" Teddy spotted him just as he came on the scene, but the shock of seeing his father unexpectedly turn up at an Upper East Side society event when he was supposed to be working himself to the bone in a Japanese hotel room wore thin when they both saw Ellie's assailant push her into the wall.

That was it. When her head collided with the panels, Chuck saw red and _protocol_ was shoved as violently to the back of his head as the punch he desperately wanted to deliver to the bastard's face. Security would take too long to get a handle on the situation, and the only thing Chuck knew in the rush of pure fatherly instinct that pumped in his veins along with the adrenaline, rage, and alcohol, was that he had to get 'Tristan' away from Ellie before things got any worse.

Yes, he pulled him off by the collar of his shirt as he had planned on his run over, but he also clenched his fingers around the material and thrust him against the opposite wall harder even than he had thrown his superior weight against the tiny body of his only daughter, and pressed his forearm firmly against the boy's throat.

"Stay the hell away from my daughter." His warning was a low and vicious growl that resonated in his ribcage.

Tristan's eyes widened slightly and he struggled to use his youth and larger muscles to break free. "Who the fuck are you?"

Chuck narrowed his eyes and leaned in to spit in the little jackass's eyes. "I'm Chuck Bass."


	34. Bass Ex Machina

**A/N: **This puppy went through a few drafts, so if you spot any errors, DO please point them out! As always, reviews are loved and appreciated, and thank you so much for reading my crazy story.

xoxo

**CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR**_  
Bass Ex Machina_

When I woke up, it was 11:00 AM on Tuesday, December 21st, 2027.

I was leaning against the balustrade overlooking a host of overjoyed skaters gliding across Rockefeller Center's ice rink, and when I realized I was in the shadow of something very massive and quite tall, I looked up to see the famous Christmas tree in all its glory. I saw my reflection in one of the enormous gilded ornaments, a small little girl in a red pea coat and a warm black beret, and all at once I realized who I was and why I was laden down with what had to be three tons of shopping.

The last vivid memory I had before that moment was of Chuck Bass bursting into the melodrama of my life like an archetypical hero on a valiant steed—the kind of hero I had always imagined as my godfather or mon grand-père or a dashing Disney prince in a flowing red cape and big black boots. He did not look the part, nor did he seem to particularly relish in playing the part, but mon père... _mon papa_ swooped in quite admirably and saved me from the terrible monster.

I shrank back against the wall and caught my breath as a very upsetting commotion rose up around me. I saw the lips moving and felt the steady hum in the air that meant seasoned gossip hounds were running back and forth across the parquet to formulate outlandish theories with their cohorts, but it was as though I had been pushed into the depths of murky ocean water and was only making out partial phrases and distorted resonance.

It was just my eyes on his, like a poignant scene from a film. Dark chocolate brown on brilliant springtime green, trembling chapped pink and smug maraschino red, fearful gasps for breath and steady puffs of irritation.

"Who the fuck are you?" Tristan spat out en Anglais.

And, because my thundering heart needed the confirmation, the dark man snarled back, "I'm Chuck Bass."

That pronouncement seemed to summon security detail from wherever they lurked when no one needed their expertise, and they pried Tristan away from the man I had tortured myself over for ten long, hazy years. There was no longer the immortal resilience of a 20-something-year-old in his eyes, which were as dark and clouded as mine. His angles were perilous and seemed to be more razor sharp with years, as if with every passing day he grew out of the lugubriousness of a tortured youth and into the quiet acceptance of a life I knew, somehow, he had never wanted.

It was fortunate that Teddy caught me under the armpits when he did, because when my legs buckled beneath me, they _really_ gave out. He and Chuck Bass, mon papa—_our_ father supported me by looping their arms through mine and setting their hands on my upper and lower back so that I did not have to slump through the sea of scrutinizing debutantes like a broken china doll.

Jenny's drawn and emotionless face called out to me from my peripheral vision, if only because my years of knowing her had led me to believe that wherever she was, so my affectionate godfather would be too. Nate, however, was on the other side of the room with his circle of comrades, and though he looked like he wanted to step in our direction and perhaps aid our limping yet rigorously dignified parade, he clenched his fingers around his tie and watched as security nudged and prodded my fallen knight out a side door.

He went in that direction instead.

"Non..." I whispered, stopping dead in my tracks and calling out to him with my eyes. "Don't."

To my left, Chuck shook his head firmly and suddenly Nate was as still as the Greek sculpture he had always been.

"Call my limo around," Chuck Bass barked at a random passing employee without bothering to stop and check the job description on his nametag. Dutifully, and with a rather alarming look of terror on his face, the valet scrambled to the concierge and began frantically gesturing with his hands. I tilted my head slightly as we passed, and wondered why the silly boy had to shout. Couldn't he just whisper? There were people nearby trying very hard to enjoy themselves.

The fairy lights glittered in the trees, and suddenly Chuck Bass had his hands on my shoulders and was pushing me gently to sit on one of the courtyard's benches. "Are you all right?" he asked, filling the long stretch of silence that had tensed in each of our throats on that long walk together.

There were a lot of things I knew I should say, but all I could do was stare in awe at his fraught face. In the dim evening light, with just the golden lights from the shimmering windows of the glorious hotel to light us, I saw all of the shadows that cast his marble-smooth face in a much more flattering glow. His lips were not frozen in a devious smirk on the glossy surface of some years-old photograph; his face was not captured in grainy lines by the ancient capabilities of an old mobile phone camera. His chest rose and fell in a ragged and worrisome motion, and his hair dangled over his forehead and into his eyes, presumably because he had not taken the time to style it properly. (I could tell from a little sweep that caught in the moonlight that he usually kept it parted and that it had been trained through years of habit to defy gravity and fall just so above his ears.) He was frenetic, energized, as if he wanted to pace back and forth or tug loose the perfectly shaped knot of his bowtie, but he stood still as a statue so he could pretend he was at ease.

But Chuck Bass was not a cold, stone figure from my daydreams. He was _real_. He was in front of me.

I did not know it, but I was in shock from both my encounter with Tristan _and_ the way it had ended, and was therefore only able to form rather disjointed thoughts utilizing the vocabulary of a precocious five-year-old. '_Chuck Bass here'_ was the predominant one, frequently joined by '_in same place as me right now where I am'_ and '_Mon dieu!'_

"Chuck Bass here in same place as am I?" All of those English lessons leaked out both ears and gathered in puddles at my feet.

"Elle?" Teddy knelt down beside me and offered an ice cold bottle of Perrier and some saltine crackers.

Without really feeling the cold of the night air, or the raw and dry scratchy stranglehold on my vocal cords, I nibbled and sipped and felt my stomach pitch forward at the abrupt comprehension that I was in Manhattan in December with two members of the Bass family nibbling saltines and sipping Perrier while recovering from an assault by a person I knew and had once trusted and I choked a bit on the crackers and had to gulp down half the mineral water a bit too fast because it got caught in my chest and I coughed so I drank some more and felt the tears welling up in my eyes and had to hunch over to give myself a comfortable, dark, alone-type space in which to breathe deeply and rhythmically.

Teddy took some initiative and reached over to awkwardly pat my back.

Bitterly cold air flooded my lungs, and when I had gasped enough mouthfuls of it to sustain me until my next panic attack, I sat back upright and blinked a few dizzied times at the unbelievable sight swimming in front of me, before my brain shut down operations and refused to think anymore. Gone out for lunch said the sign it erected on the inside of my skull. Be back in a few days.

"You're Chuck Bass," I breathed, clutching my bottle and crushing my crackers in a white-knuckled grip.

"I am," he confirmed, and then he leaned forward to inspect my clammy expression. "Are you all right?"

"Mon dieu."

All those nights staring up at my bedroom ceiling, I had never imagined that scenario. We were not in a comfortable setting, or even a _warm_ setting, and I was in no way in possession of my faculties. I was in a periwinkle blue ball gown with my dark tangles of faux curls falling out of a once beautiful hairdo; my mascara was running down my cheeks in thick and transparent black lines. He was in a tuxedo. I was sitting, and he was standing, but not behind a desk. There was no _New York Times_ or joyous hugging. Just him staring at me and me staring right back at him, and Teddy taking off his jacket to throw over my bare shoulders.

My heart was not beating a tattoo against my ribcage, but lying quite quietly in my chest while I tried to force the image of 37-year-old Chuck Bass into the 17-year-old Chuck Bass-shaped hole of him I had been cradling against me ever since that day in papère's private library near Lyon.

"I think she's in shock." Teddy tried to peer into my eyes, but they were firmly set on Chuck Bass's. "Elle? _Elle!_"

"Don't shout at her." Chuck did not resort to nervous tics I had seen from others in equally stressful situations; he had just looked calmly and a bit curiously into my unblinking eyes and quirked his lips thoughtfully. "You know her?"

"Of course I know her," Teddy replied, glancing bewilderedly between the two of us. "_I _go to school with her. Why do _you_ know her?"

That night was long, perhaps the longest and most miserable and simultaneously happy of my life. I did not know where I was at the time, because all I could do was shiver beneath Teddy's tuxedo jacket and ignore the bowl of soup delivered by a portly woman in a black dress and watch as he sat as still as an undisturbed glass of water against the backdrop of flashing lights and the sparkling city skyline. When the story grew more detailed, he stood and walked in a calm circle with one hand in his pocket and the other sweeping gracefully over his scalp to arrange his hair. He paced a little behind the chair, but each step was purposeful and confident and somehow made me feel secure where I was rooted and unmoving on a plush cream cushion.

Teddy read the papers I gave him and paced in frantic circles. Chuck even offered him a cigarette. When he found out that he was my twin, and heard from his own father's mouth that Blair Waldorf was the woman who had given birth to him and that she kept a charming residence in the 16th arrondissement of Paris, France, he collapsed into a window seat and blinked torpidly at his flickering reflection. Misty Bass, of course, was his paternal grandmother who had died in labor almost 40 years before.

Allegations. Half-truths. Angry words. All were uttered quietly and curiously by my new brother, and he nodded after each clarification in a way that told me he desperately wanted a pen and a pad of paper to take notes on. It was a terrible load of information to digest on a night he had intended to spend languishing in the lap of luxury with his beautiful new super fashion model pseudo-girlfriend.

Chuck Bass told me he had spent 16 years missing the hell out of me and that having me back was all he wanted for Christmas.

Because I was his long-lost daughter, I was promptly moved from the Archibald townhouse on E. 74th St. to his sprawling condo on the top floor of an exclusive building at 5th and East 61st; there was around-the-clock security, a doorman who had spent most of his formative years as a member of the United States Marine Corps, a valet to see to my specific needs, a battalion of butlers and maids that bowed and curtsied and referred to me as _miss_, and a bedroom he flew in a special team of emergency interior designers to make over especially for me.

It was clear to me, at long last, what he had done to make ma mère smile so enchantingly in that old photograph, because I had only consciously been a part of his life for less than 48-hours when he started treating me like a princess.

My bedroom was right next door to Teddy's, just down the hall from Chuck's, and on the same floor as the private office room that housed the books about France and the blinking red light on his personal safe.

My valet set fuzzy, warm slippers at the side of my bed every morning so I never had to suffer from a case of cold feet in the middle of dead winter (despite the fact that our condo boasted the most sophisticated central heating system money could invent), a butler brought me hot tea with lemon when I finished my morning shower, and a carpenter built a personalized and plush elaborate doghouse to accommodate my brand new snow white maltese/poodle mix. Chuck bought it for me as a 'house warming' gift, and I named her Moppet because I loved _Labyrinth_, and I asked for a pretty sterling silver "Please Return to Tiffany & Co" necklace to serve as her collar because I loved _Breakfast at Tiffany's_ (and ma mère would have been proud).

The three of us ate dinners together in the dining room, splendid meals consisting of whatever we asked for, and I started calling Chuck Bass _papa_, and then I started calling papa _daddy_ because it sent the little girl in the chateau library screaming with utmost delight.

But, until I looked up at the Christmas tree in Rockefeller Plaza and saw its magnificent lights and felt the wind on my face where it whistled through enormous pine branches, I did not let any of it sink past my skin and permeate my mind.

Christmas was rushing at New York City and the island was prepared to meet it with gusto. Everywhere I looked were wreaths, giant candy canes like the ones I had always shared with ma mère and papère on Christmas Eve, jolly Papa Noëls waving from gilded and scarlet thrones, shoppers laden with gift-wrapped purchases, carolers skipping up and down the streets belting old familiar tunes at the top of their lungs. Daddy, Teddy, and I had decided that since it was our first Christmas together, we should do our shopping at the same time; and that was exactly why I was standing all on my own above the Rockefeller Center skating rink with too many bags to carry by myself.

Mon papa et frère were in Saks Fifth Avenue picking the place apart for gifts to give me, and I was forbfidden to sneak in behind them and spy on their efforts. I had spent almost an entire hour perusing the options in Teuscher Chocolates of Switzerland up the street from Saks, stocking up on a few cursory makeup items in Sephora, and peeking in the windows of Dean & Deluca, Swarovski, and Anthropologie. I bought a few new bags at Coach with the black credit card my daddy gave me, and purchased both him and Teddy a few patterned scarves from J. Crew, where I was also able to find a pretty feminine version of the patchwork silk one daddy wore religiously.

It was strung around my neck, its vibrant colors standing out brilliantly against my vermilion pea coat, when Teddy and daddy returned with several large Saks bags. When they saw the accessory, they both smiled through their exhaustion and told me the limo was coming around to take our sinful amount of shopping back to the condo and taxi us downtown to Eleven Madison Park for dinner.

The restaurant offered specialties from Provence, and had been selected to make me feel at ease in their life.

Honestly, I was amazed they thought they had to try so hard. I felt more at home with them than I had ever felt anywhere else.

We each picked our favorite Christmas movie on the 24th (The Nightmare Before Christmas for me because I wanted to sing along to all of the songs, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang for daddy because he said there had to be at least one decent movie on our list, and The Holiday for Teddy because—and he said this with a profoundly serious face--"It has Jack Black in it so it _cannot_ be a chick flick!"), sat in the living room to watch them while the butlers and maids endured our conflicting directions for dressing the Christmas tree, and enjoyed sharing the box of treats I had purchased at Teuscher Chocolates.

Per a tradition I informed them was sacred in the Waldorf household, we each were allowed to open one gift from each person in the room before we went to bed. Because the three of us had purchased enough presents to build a display pyramid at Macy's, this ritual barely made a dent in the mountain of wrapping paper we would get to tear apart the following morning. From daddy, I chose a little box that held a beautiful handmade necklace made in the style of Anne Boleyn's famous choker; a pretty gold initial dangling from a pearl chain, with three Swarovski crystal beads swinging carelessly beneath it.

It wasn't an E, though, or a W.

It was a B. Just like Anne Boleyn's.

Just like _Bass_.

The gift I opened from Teddy was a paperback copy of _Gossip Girl_ by Dan Humphrey.

The presents my daddy and twin brother chose from me were a platinum representation of the Eiffel Tower to serve as a new paperweight on the desk in daddy's personal office, and my very first copy of _Le Petit Prince_ to replace the edition of Teddy's I had accidentally destroyed.

When I learned they did not put out their shoes in front of the fireplace for Papa Noël to fill with gifts because "We're Basses", and apparently the Bass family did not need to take cast-offs from some fat and lonely old perverted man, I practically tore the expensive Gucci loafers off their feet and could not stress enough how _important_ it was that they do everything according to custom so _Père Fouettard_ would not come and give them spankings. Teddy rolled his eyes and daddy wondered musingly if _Père Fouettard_ might be persuaded to have his position filled by someone more pleasant (and woman-shaped).

I arranged our shoes neatly at the hearth and ignored their Scrooge-like banter.

As snow danced in the glacial breeze, I sat in the window seat of my pale purple bedroom, and stared at the spectacular view of uptown Manhattan; I ran my fingers over the delicate pearls and pondered the significance of that sturdy letter 'B'. 'Elle Bass' certainly had a very catchy ring to it--"_I'm Elle Bass"_ sounded pretty snappy and important in my head—but I had to wonder what grandmamma would think. Elle Bass-Waldorf, maybe? _What a mouthful_.

Bright and early the next day, Chuck took us downstairs to the waiting limo without explanation, despite our adamant and distressed protestations that all the presents would get lonely without us there to love them. I cradled Moppet in my arms and scratched the tender spots behind her ears as we wound in and out of early morning traffic jams and listened to the jolly holiday music coming through the speakers.

As the vehicle came to a stop in the middle of Central Park, daddy reached into a large box sitting at our feet and revealed its contents to be three pairs of ice skates—black for him and Teddy, white for me. I squealed with delight, Teddy released a doomed sounding groan, and our daddy led us to a completely deserted Wollman Rink.

"Where are all the people?" I wondered, thinking that Christmastime ice skating _must_ be a tradition for the citizens of Manhattan.

Daddy laced up his skates and smirked. "The rink is closed."

"Then why are we here?" I asked with more than a little confusion staining my voice. "We can't skate if the rink is closed."

"Yes, we can," said Teddy as he hopped over the wall and held onto it for dear life.

"I bought the rink from Donald last week," daddy said, helping me stand and opening the entryway for me to step through. "Merry Christmas."

"Donald?" I grabbed onto the back of his coat for stability as my feet found their balance on the slick ice. "Donald _Trump_?"

Daddy seemed bemused by my impressed tone. "We don't know any other Donalds."

He and Teddy always said _we_ when they talked about things like who they knew or what they did or where they liked to go, and it made me feel like I had been coming to Wollman Rink with them since I was a little girl. Snow continued to drift prettily from the bright white sky, feather soft and picture perfect where it caught in our dark hair and melted on the tips of our freezing noses. Teddy attempted a few clumsy figure eights while I danced exultant pirouettes around him.

When we heard the city stirring around us, we made our way through the thick powdery hills to the limo, where we warmed ourselves with hot drinks (daddy had installed an espresso machine several years before because he hated waiting in line for what he called 'inferior cups of sludge', which set Teddy off on a long rant about the complex emotions of anger he felt towards Starbucks and other poor excuses for coffee houses that polluted the streets) and made fun of ugly and less fortunate people at stoplights.

Our presents sat glistening in the light of a roaring fire in the mammoth living room hearth when we trudged back through the front door; Teddy and I set up camp on the floor and devoted the majority of our energy digging through the pile for our own gifts and ignoring anything that wasn't addressed to us.

Serena sent me a present with a card that told me to open it when I was alone, which meant it was probably cute but naughty lingerie or some other kind of ultra girly offering; Eric and Colin had indeed decided to gift me a stylish fedora hat with Swarovski crystals embedded in its brim, and now that I had a brand new bedroom that was all mine to do what I pleased with, I could hang it from one of my bedposts; they had tacked on a last-minute-purchase for the new puppy in my life, a pretty lavender diamond-encrusted collar for her to wear for formal occasions; Lily van der Woodsen and her husband Rufus sent a framed picture of me and Maverick standing on the landing at cotillion, along with a handwritten note about how glad she was to finally welcome me into the family.

We spent the rest of the day enjoying our presents and I even convinced both of them to roast marshmallows with me over our open and very picturesque campfire. They looked displeased each time theirs caught aflame, and I giggled triumphantly as I bit into chewy s'more after chewy s'more and reveled in the simplicity of it all. It helped temper the sting of missing my family in France, who were undoubtedly meeting in the winter drawing room in Lyon for egg nog and cheesy pictures.

My life was almost like a surreal dream, too perfect to be real, too wonderful and well-organized to not have some tiny flaw—I had everything I thought I wanted and my reputation at school was looking up. I was technically though not legally a Bass, and so proclaimed the front page of Page Six when they printed a special issue dedicated to what they called my 'homecoming'. Students from Constance and St. Jude's had mysteriously acquired my mobile number and were sending me cheery texts—**we should hang out!** and **i never liked saffron neway** and **where did u get those shoes 4 cotillion their so cute n i want a pair srta liek em bt not xactly so were did u get dem n i wnt go there!**

It gave me a huge headache, but I did appreciate the thought of more and more of my classmates embracing the world of fashion.

Everything was like a fine painting done by a master artist; every brush stroke was purposeful and intentional and placed to invoke some kind of emotion or feeling or tell a specific story or symbolize something deep and meaningful. I had a father and a brother and a household full of people in finely pressed black suits to wait on me hand and foot, I received a brand new 2028 pearly white Lincoln limo complete with seat warmers and a fully stocked minibar and plasma screen TV with satellite and internet access, and I went to Bass Industries one day to see where the Bass fortune came from and was able to force the entire staff to say "Mademoiselle Waldorf" when they spoke to me.

One coffee girl slipped and referred to me as Mademoiselle Bass, but I did not correct her. I just beamed and accepted my cappuccino with grace.

But, the day after Christmas when the fluffy dream-like high started to fade into a more brisk reality, I found out exactly what made Teddy look so burdened every time he went out in public. He and I went down the street for some quaint turkey and Swiss sandwiches served on crumbling croissant bread, and I noticed a burly man followed us the entire way and took a seat at a table in the corner so he could surreptitiously watch us over the top of his copy of _The New York Times._

"That man is making me feel the creeps," I mumbled to my brother as we handed over the cash in exchange for our lunch.

Teddy cocked his left eyebrow at me and glanced fleetingly at the man who casually slipped on a pair of sunglasses and avoided eye contact.

"Grant?"

The woman behind the counter handed us our warm sandwiches and I waited for her to go back to her other duties before I leaned closer and whispered, "You _know_ him?"

"Of course I know him," he said, in that tone he had a habit of taking whenever he thought I should know something that he knew, but which was in actuality impossible for me to know because, as much as it _felt_ like I had been around him and daddy my entire life, I _had not_ and therefore was not privy to their everyday knowledge. "He's my bodyguard. Well, I guess, _our_ bodyguard now."

I sank into my seat at our cute rounded table and frowned. "Our what?"

"Bodyguard," Teddy paused to bite into his sandwich and chewed swiftly before continuing, "He used to be one of the president's personal secret service agents until dad offered him more money, and he quit to make sure I don't get snatched by some loony and held for ransom in a bunker in Algeria. Are you going to eat your chips?"

He took them without waiting for my permission, but I was too busy staring in bewilderment at 'Grant' to take any real notice. He had a bodyguard? _We_ had a bodyguard? A bodyguard who was paid more for protecting a private citizen than the leader of the free world? I wondered exactly _how much money_ my daddy had, and exactly how paranoid he was to think that anyone would be stupid enough to try and kidnap his only son in the middle of a crowded street in one of the most populated cities on the planet.

I asked these questions of Teddy while my sandwich sat neglected on its little glass plate. He took the time to swallow and swipe his napkin across his lips before he told me a horrifying story: he had once disappeared for 42 hours because a former Bass employee had followed him around for three weeks, learned his schedule, and kidnapped him from the playground before his au pair could make it from the chauffeured car to the pick-up point on the corner of the sidewalk.

He had been kept in a small room with a bed and a toilet and no window, and hadn't been released until the FBI burst in and saved him without our father having to spend a single dime on his release. Apparently his kidnapper had been wanted for grand theft auto in three states and was breaking his Pennsylvania parole by holding a meager residence in New York state.

Ever since that day, Teddy had lived with Grant the former secret service agent as his discreet bodyguard.

"You didn't notice him when we were in Washington Square Park? He was sitting on one of the benches."

I thought it was rather unnecessary for _me_ to have a bodyguard too, considering my name was legally Waldorf and I had only just come into the Bass family's life. As soon as we left the charming deli and walked across the street to slide into Teddy's black limo, however, I saw a couple of tabloid rag paparazzi advancing on us and felt in my very bones the stark contrast between my petite frame and their universally larger ones. Grant shoved them aside to allow my twin and I room to make a getaway, and I hoped I never had to benefit from his services _ever again_.

That night, when I climbed into my enormous bed with the top-of-the-line memory foam mattress and luxuriously soft silky covers and bed sheets, I hugged a whining Moppet to my chest and absentmindedly stroked her fur as I let myself be overwhelmed by the changes I had tried to accept as quickly and effortlessly as possible. I wanted my Dorota, because she would have had some peculiar words of advice to help me last through the night, and I missed maman because she was ma maman and I imagined that perhaps it was the attention of so many people and paparazzi that had driven her to hide away in France?

Daddy had told me most of the story of my past, but he had left out the details only ma mère could share with me, events she had never discussed in her Italian leather diary or even fully explained to him. He knew why she had left him to raise me and Teddy by himself, he said he understood and would wait for her, but what if it was something incredibly trivial?

What if she stopped loving him?

I saw the way his eyes became hooded and desolate when he spoke of ma mère and I felt and saw and knew that he loved her very much. But what if she didn't love him anymore?

It was not enough to be the princess in the tower and rule the Upper East Side by virtue of a name I did not even have. What I wanted was completion—it was what I had travelled from Paris to Manhattan to find, and I would not stop putting the damaged pieces together until I had a completed puzzle.

A clock ticked in a room down the hall, and I sighed into my comforter because I knew that room was my daddy's private home office, and that the clock was a Bang & Olufsen BeoSound 3 situated behind his desk, and that it ticked a few minutes late in case he needed a kick in the ass concerning paperwork. Near that odd-looking aluminum loudspeaker sat the one-of-a-kind state-of-the-art password protected top-secret Döttling Bass family safe.

What did daddy keep in it? I wondered this to the point of obsession, where even slipping on my favorite tasseled sleep mask and practicing the meditative techniques my yogi had taught me during my spiritual phase did no good. Were its contents merely boring old business files? Perhaps expensive watches and jewelry that he didn't trust to leave in private dressers and velvet cases?

Or, maybe, he kept mementos in there. Clues that could lead me to the completion I sought.

Why _had_ ma mère left Manhattan and separated me from my twin brother and wonderful father for 16 years? Did she have something to hide that could not be locked up in a safe? Or was the answer to this final question sitting just on the other side of a blinking red light? That safe was my own personal beating heart beneath the proverbial floorboards, only all I could see was that light—flashing, blinking, taunting me with the security it promised.

Security I would have to find a way to crack if I wanted to grant myself my most desired holiday wish.


	35. The Godmother

**A/N:** Wow, finally. I'm so happy to have this up. =] My goal is to have all the chapters posted by January 25th, that way I won't have spent over a year on this puppy, and that way so I have a deadline in mind and therefore cannot disappoint anybody with enormously long hiatuses ever again. I have a new computer that is performing wonderfully and I foresee many happy years with it. This is not the original version of chapter 35, because that was lost to the ages when my old computer crashed, burned, and died riddled with viruses and old age, but it serves its purpose and I hope it makes up for any annoyance anybody felt by the horrendous wait! XOXO, all of you.

Also, I don't care about this 'Evelyn' mess. _Misty _Bass forever!

This is very, very, very un-beta'd. I just wanted to post it and end this horrendous hiatus. Forgive any errors and do tell me about them if you spot them, please!

**Disclaimer:** I paraphrased a Brooke Davis quote from _One Tree Hill _and learned all about stealth wealth from Schuyler van Alen and her creator, Melissa de la Cruz.

_"Run into the garden, and bring me a pumpkin."_

_Cinderella went immediately to gather the finest she could get, and brought it to her godmother, not being able to imagine how this pumpkin could help her go to the ball. Her godmother scooped out all the inside of it, leaving nothing but the rind. Having done this, she struck the pumpkin with her wand, and it was instantly turned into a fine coach, gilded all over with gold.  
-- _Charles Perrault

**CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE**_  
The Godmother_

I emerged from the backseat of my limousine and said _merci beaucoup _to the chauffeur my daddy had hired to cart me around the city. I liked the Lincoln's pearly white ostentatious flair, knew exactly how glamorous I looked when ascending from its opulent leather backseat (a solid "Grace Kelly" on my private and very embarrassing Hollywood Glamor Scale), and was appreciative of the ample room it offered for splurge shopping storage.

My brand new grandmother Lily had taken me for tea at the Carlyle just before Christmas and informed me, in the midst of our conversation, that wealth in Manhattan was really all about stealth. Certain people tended to frown on outrageous displays of status or affluence, which meant my love of the finer things in life might be viewed as crass or tragically _nouveau riche_. I had considered her words for all of 3.7 seconds, then spotted a crop of such pecking hens eying me from a few tables over, and come to the swift conclusion that those people were stuffy and boring and just jealous that they couldn't rock an Anna Sui bubble-hemmed crepe de chine mini.

The day I wore jeans from The Gap or a knit sweater from Abercrombie & Fitch was the day I turned my back on all that was good and Elle with the world.

I had dressed for comfort that morning – meaning I had slipped a _hand wash only _Stewart + Brown merino wool sweatercoat over a silk pullover dress and protected my legs by pairing my ensemble with a pair of textured black Eloise tights – and was immensely glad for it. One sweeping look at the uneven sidewalk pavement, the chipping paint on surrounding stoops, and the ugly garage door graffiti art on either side of the prim pink-and-white café at 248 Broome Street, and I was almost dizzily happy that I had opted to wear practical brown leather pull-on construction boots.

My first choice had been 4" Valentino rosette peep-toe pumps.

I had no idea why we were meeting so early so soon after Christmas, and on the Lower East Side no less, but it really had been too long. I had so many things to catch her up on, so many questions that no longer needed to be asked but which I wished she had been around to answer, so many wild stories to hear about her 'holiday' in the Italian Riviera. What men had she dated? Had she toured the rest of the country and, if so, had she brought me anything from Via Montenapoleone? And, if she hadn't, what did she intend to buy me to make up for it?

She could have easily come to visit me in the comfort of my new luxurious home, or asked to meet me for lunch at the boat house or Gracie Mews or any other of my new dining haunts. We could have flirted with the well-dressed waiters, ordered obscenely expensive items off the menu only to send them back and demand complimentary dessert, sampled delicious imported wine (from France, évidemment) and been seated by the windows the better for onlookers to see and admire. Instead, we were incognito between Orchard and Ludlow, _below Houston Street _and not even in SoHo_._ The only people who would admire us would be hobos. Or worse, _Lower East Siders_.

My godmother was just lucky I loved her so much, and was prepared to endure a sweet tooth overload at a place called Babycakes. (It sounded like it should have housed low dollar strippers in trashy Alice in Wonderland get-ups. I was, in fact, expecting to find just that.) I squeezed through the cramped front door and spotted her instantly, sitting by herself at a tiny table and punching away at her QWERTY keyboard with more speed and precision than even the deftest of my recently acquired minions. Handmaidens. "Friends".

Before I could part my lips to form the first syllable of _bonjour_, Serena unleashed a squeal more high-pitched than anything I had attempted since the age of seven. It was jarring, undignified, a bit too over-the-top, and altogether unpleasant, but that was my godmother; and when her arms went around me and she peppered me with delighted kisses, she smelled as she always had. Sunshine and Dolce & Gabbana. It was like every last ray of light wound its way through her hair and seeped into the golden brown of her skin so that, on gloomy winter days such as that one, the world would see her and remember what it was like to be in the presence of white summery bliss.

"Elle belle," she crooned, pulling back to arm's length to drink in my features. Her navy blue eyes sparkled with all the brilliance of a spinning mirror ball. "Oh, I've missed you."

"I 'ave missed you too."

I wanted to say so much more, but how would that have been for a friendly greeting?

_Why didn't you ever tell me? Why weren't you here for cotillion? Why don't you ever answer your phone? When are you going to change that voice mail message? And, while I'm asking questions, why did m__ère leave daddy? Why didn't I know about Teddy or daddy at all? Would anyone have told me if I hadn't come here? If so, when were you planning on it and did you think I wouldn't be absolutely furious and hate all of you forever? Didn't you think I deserved to know about my family? About my TWIN? About my daddy? (Who is, undoubtedly, the best daddy there ever was. I can't believe you kept him from me all these years!) Why does mère hate daddy?_

My mental list of inquiries grew longer every time I thought about it. It would have to wait until after the macaroons and hot tea.

The heat inside the café was oppressively stifling. After five minutes of playing catch-up, I removed my plum coat and asked the woman behind the counter for some ice water to cure my arid throat. When she paused in the act of pouring to ask how many ice cubes I wanted in my glass, I put my face in my hands and muttered a carefully phrased oath about the incompetence of American food service (not to mention the rampant epidemic that was the country's pathetic lack of common sense).

I knew my godmother had heard me when I heard a muffled giggle, and looked up to see her hiding in the folds of her ruffled scarf. "I guess that answers my question."

She chewed her bottom lip to contain her trademark smile, and dipped a finger into her teacup to flick some of the piping hot tart cherry green tea brew in my face.

"What question?" I shook out the napkin I had used to shield myself from her attack and spread it across my knees, trying to pretend it wasn't made out of _paper_. (The fact that it had scalloped edges is a fact I am still trying to erase from my memory.)

"My question about how you're adjusting to life in New York." Serena wrinkled her nose at me and took a bite out of her scone.

The conversation seemed to grow wings from there, and we fell into the nonsensical rhythm we had perfected over years of all-night 'slumber parties' in the luxury suites of hotels all over France – hotels I finally knew had opened their doors to her free of charge on the courtesy of her status as an extended member of the Bass dynasty. This meant, my brain finally realized with a shock-wave that sent a tremble trilling from the base of my skull all the way to the bottoms of my freshly manicured toes, that Serena van der Woodsen, Manhattan socialite extraordinaire, internationally renowned globe trotter, wildly successful editorial model, shining blonde bombshell re-imagining of Holly Golightly from 2019's classic _Breakfast at Fred's, _was not only my glittering gold godmother, but a shiny new family member I could call _tante_.

This newly discovered connection with her seemed to wordlessly fortify the already solid bond of our mentor-protégée friendlationship. We fluttered from topic to topic on a breeze of informality; she had amusing commentary for every episode of what I informed her was officially called _The Saffron Debacle_:_ The Fall of a Really Pathetic Monarchy_, I played the part of the scandalized innocent when she waxed on and on about her wild nights in Santa Margherita and all the various ways she had entertained her delicious Italian boyfriend, and we indulged each other with_ ooh_s and _aah_s as we swapped Christmas shopping horror stories. In terms of sheer danger, _Aunt Serena_ probably had me beat – the queues in Italia were horrendous and could hardly be called 'lines' by even the loosest definition of the word.

The only hiccup in the conversation occurred when my aunt(!!!!!!) paused to wipe her mouth and asked, in that innocently curious way only someone who had been sunning in the Mediterranean for the past few months of my life could have done, about my love life.

"I do not have one," I answered a little too promptly, twisting the ugly napkin between my fingers and trying to look very busy watching the steam rise from my teacup.

Perhaps my failure to meet her eyes gave her the false impression that I was keeping some namelessly handsome blue blood chéri all to myself, because she nudged my shin with her foot. "You don't have _one _boy – "

"Non." This time, I punctuated my denial with a sharp lift of my chin. "No one."

We finished our tea in a discomfited silence, Serena waiting patiently for me to elaborate on my romantic situation, me looking carefully at anything but her and imagining a world in which I had been able to say a blushing _oui_ and carry on and on about mon amour until her ears bled from the details. In Paris, just weeks ago, that would have been my hushed response – I would have cast a paranoid glance around the café to ensure our conversation was too quiet for eavesdropping ears, and then unleashed a girlishly delighted tidal wave of the dashing Tristan Marchand and all the promises he had made me.

Phantom lips brushed my neck as ghostly traces of the patterns he had drawn across my skin with his fingers tingled and pricked unpleasantly. Daddy had assured me, with a hard cut in his jaw that told me there would be hell to pay if he was wrong, that Tristan had been deported to France and would never darken my life again (under pain of an airtight restraining order). All the same, I felt vulnerable when I remembered the well-paid bodyguard I had so thoughtlessly failed to bring with me – I would never take his presence for granted again.

By the time I had finished my crème-filled Fauchon macaroons and swallowed almost half of my zippy candy cane/cranberry/vanilla chai blend, I had mostly regained the use of my vocal chords, and was able to resuscitate our reunion with some colorful commentary on the cracked and vacant little shops that sat outside the petite boulangerie. We twittered back and forth about what we thought of that season's winter fashion, the looks we planned to pull together for the following Spring, and whether or not we should just give up on the mainstream news entirely and cancel our subscriptions to _Vogue_ and, my personal favorite, _Elle_.

"The dress Aunt Jenny made me for cotillion was a little like the Maggie Sottero in January's _Harper's Bazaar_," I dipped a toe into the stormy sea that was the subject of the debutante ball. After all, I did not know if she had read anything about my American debut in the society pages, or perhaps heard something from my daddy or Uncle Eric about the catastrophe that had been my much photographed and wildly gossiped about grand Bass limo exit; and, most importantly of all, I had not one inkling about her uncharacteristic absence. "I wish you could have seen."

"I know you looked _amazing_. Mom sent me the picture of you and your escort."

"I looked better in person," I pressed, leaning forward and resting my chin on my fist. "The picture didn't show all the little details..."

"'Figure flattering pleats throughout the bodice and a band of beads and jewels at the natural waistline, an A-line silhouette in shimmer taffeta with a caught-up skirt and corset back.'" Serena propped her own chin on her opposite fist and flourished her memorized quote with a grand wink. "All the fashion columns were buzzing about it, et _mais oui_, ma petite poupée, you were très magnifique et la reine du bal, and I could shower you with compliments all morning and _still _not make up for the fact that I was late for my flight and missed the whole thing."

The penitent look on her face was too precise for someone who did not already know I was upset. "Uncle Eric called you, didn't he."

It was not a question, a subtly inflected fact she picked up on quite admirably.

"Oui, and I want to make it up to you."

"Are we going shopping?" My posture instantly improved as my fingers twitched towards my olive patent leather Orla Kiely carryall. "Can we go back uptown? I have my limousine!"

"Oh! That reminds me," Serena crossed left leg over her right knee, and leaned her elbows against the edge of the table to implore me with the full strength of her feared puppy dog face. "_Please_ tell me you haven't already been to the three Bs."

I was pretty confident that daddy's black credit card had been swiped at every store and boutique worth frequenting, but I was tentatively excited about the thought of a new and exciting catalog of items to peruse. "The three whats?"

Serena glowed when she chirped, "The three Bs, silly. Barney's, Bergdorf's, Bendel's!"

I wilted and my short-lived fantasy shopping excursion promptly went _poomf_. "I did not know they were in a _gang_, but mais oui, I have been to all three of them."

"I wanted to take you the first time," my aunt(!!!!!!!!!) pouted, her tone an elegy for the hypothetical experience she had lost. She dropped a few dollar bills on the table and threaded her left arm through my right as she led me back into the snow-ridden Manhattan air.

"If it will make you feel better," I supplied, "you can get me the three Gs."

"Oooh," It was Serena's turn to look excitedly bewildered. Her version of the facial expression differed from mine in that it resembled a four-year-old's. "And what are those?"

"Gold, Godiva, Gucci, _silly_!" I raised the pitch of my voice to better match hers, which earned me a playful kick in the back of my knee as I slid into the heavenly comfort of my Lincoln's wonderfully climate-controlled backseat. "My jewelry, chocolate, and purse preferences."

She chuckled as she situated herself beside me and moved the hem of her pea coat away from the slamming door. "Speaking of gifts..."

I saw the mechanics of her facial muscles as they individually tensed and relaxed, and the minor acts of apprehension showed me a detailed study on how Bouguereau's glorious Venus could become, with the passage of decades, _The Madonna of the Roses._ Her gaze waved back and forth between both of my eyes, as she seemed to be deciding which one would better benefit from the view; she ceased to be the mythical goddess from my childhood daydreams, and the veil parted to reveal an ordinary woman whose expression gave away the secrets all her night cremes and visits to the microdermabrasion clinic could no longer fully keep.

There was a part of me that expected her to realize she had been found out, to shift the light that filtered through the windows and gleam at me like the ageless sprite of never ending cheer and joy she had always been. There was an even bigger part of me that _wished_ for that, because I could not stand to see her diminished at the time when I needed her most. But, she remained unwaveringly pale and serious and put her hand on my knee. Her touch grounded me in reality, and though I could feel the wheels turning smoothly beneath the floor of the auto, the sudden maelstrom in her usually steady eyes pitched me about in an unfamiliar sea.

"Did you like your Christmas present?"

For such a breathless build-up, I had expected something more life-altering. I could not seem to remember opening anything with her name on it. "My Christmas present?"

Her forehead puckered, and I felt her hand curl into a loose fist on top of my leg. "The package I sent you in the mail. You didn't get it?"

I thought back to the pile of gifts that had been underneath the elaborate tree that Christmas morning, remembered the obscene amounts of wrapping and tissue paper that had littered the snow white floor, and went through my mental checklist of all the pretty little embroidered thank-you notes I had already asked Teddy to organize and address for me, and nothing brought to mind a single offering from Tante Serena.

"It had a card on it that asked you to open it in private?" she offered, and that jogged my memory.

I had assumed the little box contained high-dollar lingerie or maybe a carton of her signature Dolce & Gabbana _Donna Fatale _perfume, the American film noir campaign for which featured her as a sophisticated reincarnation of Veronica Lake. The fact that it still sat, unopened, somewhere on my vanity or buried underneath bracelets and earrings in the top drawer of my dresser, prompted me to fight down an embarrassed blush and so I could shoot her the most enthusiastic fake smile I had managed to muster up in quite a long time. It could not hold a candle to her own similar sunny expression, but she had had much more time to practice and, after all, I could not be expected to get _too _worked up over whatever thoughtful but impersonal trinket she had air mailed to me that year.

"I love it!" I gushed, hoping I could phrase my sentences carefully enough as to not reveal how totally ignorant I was. Blair Waldorf had taught me better than that. "It is exactly what I wanted, but did not_ know_ I wanted. Comment avez-tu su?"

No matter how nicely ambiguous I had managed to sound, Serena was somehow not fooled. She rolled her eyes, leaned back against the left back door and crossed her arms over her chest.

"I know that face, Ellie," she pinched her lips together in a humorless smile. "It's the same one Blair makes when she forgets what my boyfriend's name is."

"Marcello?" I guessed, because honestly I could not keep track of her many boyfriends any better than ma mère could.

"Sergio!" Serena huffed. "But that's beside the point. You need to open that present as soon as you get home, comprenez-tu?"

"Pourquoi?"

But she would elaborate no further than to say some variant of _"it's just really, really important that you open it as _soon_ as you get home"_ four or five more times, all the while carefully avoiding my inquiring gaze as she waited for the traffic to clear so she could scurry away from me and into her hotel.

"Serena," I reached out to touch her arm when her fingers twitched towards the door handle, and she paused to turn her head and glance at me through a curtain of her honey silk hair. "You're staying in the city, aren't you?"

We had had such a short time together, I had barely been able to really discuss all the questions turning and multiplying in my mind. If only we could sit somewhere quiet and not bother with chit chat and small talk...

My godmother reached across her body to press her palm against my knuckles. There was a gentle smile on her face that told me she was not saying adieu to me or New York just yet, and then she slipped out into the chilly morning and shut the door behind her. A few halfhearted snowflakes fluttered on the ghostly breeze and melted into the dark strands of my curly extensions as I watched her sidestep her way through a bustling crowd the way only a true born-and-bred city girl could have done, and then her shining head disappeared behind rotating doors, and I was alone.

Maybe it was better. So many others had let me down on the forthcoming-information front, and she had clammed up rather stoically about the strange importance of her mysterious Christmas present; perhaps it was better not to bother. What reason did I have to believe that Serena would be different from anyone else? 'It's not my business to say' or 'You should ask your mother' were more likely to come out of her mouth than 'Okay, here is the entire story with all the truthy details'.

It was better to soldier on and make my discoveries on my own. It had worked so far.

The driver did not wait for my instructions to begin the winding route back to the Bass penthouse, because she knew I was due to meet my father, brother, grandmamma, and saba for brunch at 1136 5th Avenue less than two hours. If I was going to sneak back up to ma chambre and pretend to have been taking an extra long morning bubble bath while everyone else slept in, I couldn't dawdle on street corners.

Fortune was on my side, because when I ascended to the apartment, everything was as dim and peacefully quiet as I had left it. Moppet puttered down the stairs and across the marble floor to greet me, and I hurriedly scooped her into my arms before she could bark or whine and wake anyone.

"Shhh," I pressed my fingers to her cold snout and dropped a kiss between her wagging ears.

There was a bit of clanging in the kitchen that meant the staff was already hard at work making preparations for my maternal grandparents' arrival, and the get-together that would serve as our odd little family's entire Chanukah celebration. I had been too wrapped up in my own personal issues to attend the nightly dinners my saba had put together for most of his Jewish friends and co-workers, and I had desperately missed out on my annual eight days of bounty, so it had been my idea to get everyone together and celebrate for the first time as a real cohesive family.

_Except it's not really the whole family, is it?_

An annoying little voice that did not sound at all like me had taken the habit of reminding me that maman was still across the Atlantic, all alone in Paris with her stylish Christmas tree and only Dorota to exchange presents with.

At least, that's how I had come to imagine it.

But, that day, I had a mission that would hopefully bring me one step closer to riddling out exactly why Blair Waldorf had left her throne in Manhattan to reign over a foreign kingdom. The upstairs hallway was still, as though under a sleeping spell, and when I pressed my ear to my father's bedroom door, I heard only the deafening silence he required for a solid night's rest.

His office was a few doors down, wide open and unguarded, because the only things worth hiding were kept locked up in the Döttling safe behind his desk. I thought there must be piles of crisp clean money in there, maybe stacked alongside a few gold bars (because my daddy was just as ostentatious as I), on the same shelf as a collection of rare and exotic diamonds.

But I had a sneaking suspicion there were _other_ things in there, too, things that might concern the dissolution of my parents' marriage and helpful hints about how to fix it.

I let the door _snick_ shut behind me, but was careful to hold the knob so that it didn't make a sound as the latch caught in the lock. The time on the Bang & Olufsen BeoSound 3 read some minutes after 9 AM, which seemed highly implausible – had I really been downtown and back all before noon?

I slid out of my boots, the better to walk quietly across the herringbone parquetry and onto the thick Arabian rug that cushioned daddy's work desk, and the shelves and storage spaces behind it. The security light on the safe mocked me with its steady blinking pattern – precisely one second between each silent beep, and I knelt in front of it to examine the little keypad underneath it. Daddy had punched a 6 digit code into it a few days earlier as I watched breathlessly through the miniscule crack in the doorway, so now I only had to overcome fathomless improbabilities and guess the right combination.

Of course, I had not entered the office without a list of possibilities. My birth date was one, along with daddy's own, and maman's just in case he was that sentimental. I did not waste thoughts on what I would do if none of those options worked, because I had tricked my pessimistic brain into thinking positively.

That was what made it so utterly depressing when _none of them_ opened the door.

I had been so sure of mine and Teddy's birthday that I had entered 061511 with a little of a triumphant gleam in my eye. When that failed to turn the taunting red light green and allow me entry, I thought – well, of course, it must be in the European style, in honor of all my years abroad. But 150611 was just as incorrect as daddy's birthday after it, and even numerous tries of maman's birthday after that.

Perhaps it was something spelled out numerically? CHUCK B. 248252.

Wrong.

BLAIR B. 252472.

Wrong.

BLAIR W. 252479.

Very, very wrong.

I tried the same thing with my name, once with W. and once with B. When that likewise failed to crack the security code, I did the same with Teddy's without even realizing that neither of our names fit the 6 digit requirement. Then, I got desperate and started punching in all sorts of unlikely numbers, and it was only after I unsuccessfully attempted BASSDORF, CHAIR, and WALBASS that I realized how fruitless my guessing game really was.

Daddy's office chair was custom-crafted Humanscale and very comfortable, which made my sulking a relaxing affair. I rested my chin on my crossed arms and stared at the row of pictures lining the outskirts of the lacquered Parnian desk – the magnificent Archibalds with their broad smiles and sad eyes, Evelyn "Misty" Parker Bass in all her dark and exotic glory, Nate and daddy as young men in the city, several of daddy and Teddy with various people I did not know, and even a hilariously large photograph of the living extended Rhodes-Van der Bass-Humphrey family (minus moi et ma mère, bien sûr).

I picked up the black-and-white shrine to Misty Bass and cradled it in my lap so I could look down at her radiant smile; I did my best to copy it in my polished glass reflection. As I tilted the frame up and down to try and catch our identically straight white teeth at precisely the same angle, I noticed something at the top right corner.

The pin-up beauty shot of my long dead Bass grandmother ended less than an inch shy of the ornate little frame, but there was something else – a white piece of paper of some kind – tucked carefully underneath to create the illusion that her fading face filled the entire rectangular space.

Now, to anyone else this might have just seemed like a nice little decorative gesture, an aid to fit a pretty old picture in its ideal vintage frame, but I fancied myself something of a connoisseur at finding secreted-away pictures in their altogether-quite-obvious hiding places, so I didn't even pause to consider my actions as I turned the whole frame over and undid the little snaps that kept its contents in place.

Two pictures fell into my open palms. The first was, of course, Misty's old and weathered likeness, but the second was from an entirely different era, printed on entirely different material, depicting an entirely different scene. It was one I had seen before, tucked away in a drawer in maman's girlhood bedroom, of mère at 20 years old, her chestnut hair dripping down her back in delicate curls that ended just before the waistline of her pale ivory dress. Père lifted la voile de mariage de ma mère and kissed her in front of politely clapping company.

_**December 27, 2010.**_

My daddy had to be the most romantic man in the world! And he wasn't even French.

I twirled the chair around so fast that had the wheels been touching the wood flooring, I would have slid right into something and made a terrible racket. As it was, I was able to reach out and hurriedly press 1, 2, 2, 7, 1, and 0 without alerting anyone to my top secret doings.

And when the light beeped and shifted from ruby to emerald, I was able to turn the handle, push the heavy door aside, and look upon the collection of things daddy considered so very valuable. There _were_ gold bars, the $10,000 watch and really gross looking old boring American baseball signed by some famous femme in a glass cube daddy had told me he had spent 'years tracking back down', along with all sorts of official looking documents and other private memorabilia.

I glanced back at the door to make sure no one had slipped in behind me without my noticing, then dug through the assortment of things as carefully as I could, to avoid shifting everything out of place. I found a few items that made no sense whatsoever, and a few things that did: files on moi et ma mère which tracked our movements in France from a discreet and respectful distance. Medical records and report cards and certificates of merit, along with copies of my old school photos.

Then, in a simple mahogany box with a gold clasp, I found something much more useful.


	36. La Reine est morte, vive la Reine

**CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX**_  
La Reine est morte, vive la Reine_

Teddy looked from my glittering reflection to his jaunty bow tie and back.

"We're both all sparkly," he lamented.

I brushed my fingers across the lines of my dress's boned bodice and tilted my head the better to examine the clean cut of his crisp black wool mohair two-button tuxedo. It fit him like a hemmed and tailored suit of armor, the shoulders sharper than the edge of a QVC gimmick knife, the slim pleated evening shirt blindingly white, the tie a multi-colored starry night sky on black silk twill.

"What is it with you and Gucci?" I wondered aloud, turning on my suede leather-wrapped heels to adjust his black satin lapels. Even the impeccably shined leather shoes on his feet had silver Gucci horsebits strung through their fronts.

He shrugged and ran his fingers through his already stylishly haphazard hair. "I'm too young to wear Yves Saint Laurent."

"Well, either way," I patted his chest when I was satisfied with his appearance, and went back to obsessing over perfecting my own, "you look _very_ George Clooney."

"George Clooney?" Teddy made a face and tweaked his bow tie so it looked as though he had tied it without any regard for its evenness. "Can't I be Brad Pitt?"

"Non," I answered solemnly. "Only Brad Pitt can be Brad Pitt."

We were in the middle of my very crowded (color-coded) walk-in closet, amidst mountains of pretty shoes and short party dresses I had carefully considered and arbitrarily discarded over the previous hour and a half. The one I had finally settled on was a strapless, shimmering study in lustrous onyx and its precious metal colors composed a pixel-perfect print. The notched bust had origami folds to show off the positive effects of my silky La Perlas, and its voluminous pleated skirt swished just right when I twirled.

I wanted to make a statement to all the Constance Billard girls who had texted and called in with their support, and obviously I wanted it to be better than whatever Saffron showed up in. Oh, plus I wanted to ring in 2028 looking my absolute best; so my makeup was impeccably smoky, my hair was in a loosely wavy bun with whimsical tendrils glancing across my bare shoulders, and my shoes added exactly 3.25 inches to my height.

I had foregone earrings because I hated wearing them in dead winter and feeling icy medal against my skin, and instead was sifting through a jingling drawer full of filigree baubles and diamond-encrusted bands. None of them, however, would ever _possibly_ do.

There were roughly forty-five minutes before the official beginning of Scarlett's fashionable izakaya New Year's Eve party, and if Teddy and I wanted to be in the West Village on time (read: fifteen minutes late at the earliest) we would need to call the limousine around and get going...

...Just as soon as I made a final decision about my accessories.

Right on cue, daddy appeared from around the corner, dark and coiffed and dashing in classic Yves Saint Laurent, and leaned against the chambranle. There was a half-empty tumbler of single malt in his right hand which was of no use to me because I was terrible at drinking whisky, and a chunky gold necklace dangling from his left which looked like it would go tragically well with my ensemble.

"Papa!" I beamed, and his lips quirked slightly in response. I tried to say his new name as often as possible whenever we spoke, to make up for all the years it had gone unspoken. "Gold does not go avec ton couleur à tous les, j'ai peur."

"Then it must not go with your coloring either," he joked, tossing the necklace so that it landed in my waiting palms. Up close, I recognized it as the gift Aunt Jenny had sent me for Christmas, an offering from her burgeoning accessories line, _J_.

"Do not be silly," I admonished, doing up the shepherds hook at the back of my neck and admiring the way the pendant settled in just the right oversized way on my décolletage, in luminous discs that formed a fiery pyramid beneath grand orbs of gold. I added a deep velvet green tuxedo-inspired jacket for warmth, and I was officially dressed. "My complexion is much better than yours."

"It's Blair's," he mused, mostly to himself.

He was not as closed-lipped about his feelings for ma mère as she was about the entire subject of him. I knew that if I asked, he would tell me all about how they fell in love, maybe entertain me with a few horror stories about some of the more tame antics they had gotten up two as the scheming nouveau riche king and WASP queen of the Upper East Side, and he would do so with a boyish grin on his face and a happy twinkle in his eyes – the same deep, calculating and deceptively reflective eyes he had passed on to me. But, when pressed, he would say only that the details of her departure were maman's business and only she could explain herself with any accuracy.

Teddy shifted so he could fish his cell phone from his pocket and pretend he hadn't heard that name leave our father's lips. He was still getting used to the fact that his mother was not cold and dead but vibrant and alive, out there somewhere, a stranger with a face not unlike his own – and that she was entirely inaccessible to him. It was not me that he could not adjust to, because the two of us had fallen into the role of bickering siblings rather admirably, but the fact that his family should be complete, but wasn't.

I knew exactly how he felt.

Daddy had his own party to go to that evening, with more civilized, adult people like his step-mother Lily, members of the Bass Industries board, and even Aunt Serena and my godfather. Aunt Jenny would, instead, be at a party being thrown for her at her design house's Fashion Avenue headquarters. Apparently, Nate had officially moved all of this things out of the Archibald townhouse and into the penthouse of daddy's Empire Hotel, and he would remain there until Aunt Jenny found some other place to live. Then, as far as daddy could tell, when Nate could move back in at E. 74th Street, they would file jointly for a clean-cut 50/50 divorce.

My thoughts immediately went to Lux. She had not contacted me since the cotillion, not even to offer her congratulations or her loyal service as my right-hand lady-in-waiting. The sting I had felt at her betrayal was still fresh in my memory, but I was no longer so passionately unforgiving. She was only a freshman, after all, and an impressionable one at that. Who knew what tactics Saffron had employed to get her to spill my intimate family secrets?

Besides, the joke was on Saffron now that I was living my dream.

I would seek Lux out at the party and offer an olive branch. Or, failing an actual olive branch, a box of hand-rolled dip dye Hermès scarves to replace the gang of Juicy Couture travesties in her wardrobe. We could probably take a detour and swing by the boutique on Madison Avenue before winding our way to 8th Avenue and down to Hudson below Morton... If it was closed, I could call Martina and have her send someone to open the shop for me.

"I'll see you two tomorrow. Don't do anything I wouldn't do." Daddy polished off the remainder of his Johnnie Walker's and set the Baccarat crystal down on top of the mirrored dresser. Teddy waved from where he had settled on my white chaise lounge, but I skipped over to papa and gave him a huge hug and two air kisses (I was wearing very delicate lipstick).

"Au revoir, papa."

Sometimes, I felt like if I pinched myself, I would wake up in Lyon with a pony and a picture and a papère and grand-père and Dorota and maman, but no père or frère. In Teddy's limousine, I watched the sights flicker past and wondered why it had been necessary to trade one life for the other.

Why couldn't I – we, Teddy and I – have it all?

It had been days since my triumph over daddy's safe, but I had not been able to use what I had found. There were always too many people around – a maid cleaning in the hallway, a valet shining shoes downstairs, daddy hard at work in his office, or Teddy rooted in his enormous entertainment room shooting pool and playing video games with Lex. I had been forced to leave my new ammunition in the back of the safe, where it would stay until I could find a quiet moment to take it out of its mahogany box and finally, hopefully, conclude my long search for answers.

The party was pretty lively when Teddy and I entered the Japanese brasserie, which Scarlett had rented out for a truly spectacular Constance Billard-St. Jude's exclusive holiday bash. Everything was darkened, lit only by glowing paper lanterns and festively chic fairy lights, and people milled in and out of the various rooms carrying drinks from the bar or little snacks from the beautiful spread laid out in the main dining room. I caught a few people with their shoes off, but decided mine would most certainly stay on – we weren't actually in Japan, after all, and my shoes were an important part of my stunning outfit.

"Teddy!"

A voice called my brother's name over the music, and suddenly Scarlett appeared from the midst of a group of chatting party-goers and wrapped her arms around his neck in a delightedly adorable greeting. He looked more than a little stunned; even though they had been official for 13 days (he mentioned the count every morning over brunch), he still couldn't quite believe he was dating the girl of his dreams.

I gave Scarlett a smile and left them to their own smoochy devices. It was best not to interrupt a couple in the throes of sickening young love. I did allow myself one short, gloating look before departing; after all, I had played _the_ most integral role in bringing them together.

Feeling smug at yet another enormous check in my ever-expanding column of positives, I ordered a ginger martini from the cutest boy behind the restaurant's bar, and made my way through the throngs of people in search of a certain head of blonde hair.

Saffron, who had gotten it right for once in a short ruffled cocktail dress and blueish-gray heels, was standing right in the middle of my path, as she always seemed to do. Spidery long legs and ice blue eyes and all, she seemed even less impressive than ever without a single accessory and her glossy hair piled on her head in a careless bun.

That hadn't exactly been the 'head of blonde hair' I had been looking for. I needed to learn to be more specific with my goal statements.

"New girl," she greeted, clinging to her last shred of superiority. Without her gaggle of minions flanking her sides and puffing up her importance levels, her mask of bravado was as comical as a commedia-style farce.

"Old girl," I said in response.

I sensed she had some sort of speech prepared, perhaps a stirring declaration of resignation or some heartfelt proclamation about how she was just like every other girl in the world and only ever wanted to be loved and admired because her parents were never around to do that for her, but it was easy for me to pretend like those four monosyllabic words were all that we owed each other. She had been Tristan's ticket through the Palace doors the night of the debutante ball, she had tried to speed along the completion of his wicked plan.

She had destroyed my bicycle.

We did not like each other and we never would.

The verdict was in, and I had won. Why drag her torture out? It was much easier to act like she had never existed.

Besides, I had better things to do than indulge her.

The old Queen is dead. Long live the Queen.

So, I shouldered past her and into the humming lounge area, where I hoped Lux might be standing at-the-ready with my new courtiers. But Cordelia and Laurel told me they hadn't seen her all night, while Anneliese, Nicole, and Carolyn (I had finally managed to learn their names!) all agreed she was flitting around _somewhere_ in one of the more secluded rooms.

I checked both tatami rooms, where most of the shoeless cretins had gathered to down their sake drinks, pass around a single designer joint, and be generally uproarious, and was glad to see that my god sister had not gotten caught up in that undignified revelry. The room down the hall was a little more smoke free, though no less crowded; four chairs surrounded a small square table that was already littered with empty glasses and soiled napkins, and against the dark wood-paneled wall was a four-person couch upon which seven people were somehow sitting.

Lex and Julian waved as best they could from the middle of the fray, and I stopped my searching to squeeze through the sliding doors and over to their precarious perch.

"Bonjour, little lovebirds," I kissed both of them on their cheeks, and gave my god brother an understanding little smile, which he met with a pair of glazed over sky blue eyes. I didn't agree with his chosen method of coping, but I did understand that he probably thought he needed it now more than ever. Though I had never been in the thick of a highly-publicized society divorce, I did know what it was like to be a child of a broken family and to feel, above all, that it was entirely your fault. "How is the party?"

Lex took my hand in his and squeezed it lightly, while Julian wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me in so that I could sit across their laps. "Très fantastique, ma petite sushi roll."

"Tu êtes _très_ stupide," I rolled my eyes at his abysmal pronunciation.

"Mais," Julian picked up the pendant of my necklace so he could examine it, "tu m'aimez."

"Stop butchering my language," I commanded, swatting his hand away. Then, I straightened his tie for him and asked, "Have you seen Lux?"

Julian slid his hand back over Lex's open palm and nodded at another set of sliding doors. I pecked him once more on his cheek in silent thanks, blew his boyfriend another little kiss (and made a mental note to check up on the poor thing throughout his parents' divorce proceedings), and then gracefully managed to set both my feet back on the ground without showing any of the assembled prep school perverts the more intimate sections of my sheer, patterned tights.

The room she had chosen to hide out in was like a little library, lined with shelves adorned with antique Japanese books and pottery; the ceiling arched high overhead, with woodwork patterns crisscrossing over white curved panels, and everything was illuminated by a single bamboo lamp. Lux was sitting in the corner, perusing the pages of one of the novels even though I was certain she didn't know one scrap about reading kanji.

"Hello," was all I said when she looked up at me.

"Hello," she said right back.

"I brought your Christmas present."

I pulled the orange rectangular box out of the same leather Marc Jacobs bag I had been carrying the day of what I not-too-fondly remembered as the occasion of The Yogurt Incident. It was as pristine as the day I bought it, and much too large to be toting around at a party, but I felt it was important to acknowledge even the embarrassing past as I moved into the much brighter, dairy-free future.

That, and it was all sparkly.

"I don't have one for you." She wasn't lodging a protest, merely stating a plain fact.

I merely grinned and put the box of scarves on the table beside her. "Think of this as more of a charitable donation."

I knew her well enough to recognize the smile lingering just on the other side of her lips, and she had been my best friend for too many years to be offended by my friendly insult. As her fingers slipped underneath the tissue paper to grasp at the bounty of pretty patterns beneath, I slid onto the arm of her chair to fiddle with the curly strands of hair she had plaited into a knot at the nape of her neck.

"Thanks, E Dub." She twisted a very pink cashmere selection around her fingertips in a very morose way, and I planted a kiss at the crown of her head as I pulled her into my arms for as warm a hug as I had given anyone in months. "These are really great."

"I heard about Nate and Aunt Jenny," I said into her hairline. She sighed and carefully retied the white ribbon that kept the box's lid clamped down on its precious (and heinously expensive enough to make up for any transgressions either one of us had ever committed) cargo. "Je suis très désolé, nuisette."

"C'est bon," she said in a would-be casual voice, her eyes glistening miserably. "Je vivrai. At least now I won't have to listen to their griping anymore."

"Je sais."

"I guess you aren't E Dub anymore, are you?" Lux laid her head against my shoulder and we both stared across the room at the orange fringed star orchid dangling over the rim of its clear glass vase. The music from blasting full volume in the main dining room was a distant and steady _boom-boom thump, ba-boom-boom thump, _and I was glad for Lux's private sensibilities – it was much easier to have an actual conversation away from the pecking order when, well, the pecking order was off in another room."Should I call you E Bee? Or maybe something like Eebie Jeebies. Or I guess _Queen_ Bee would be more appropriate."

"I told you I would steal the crown," I reminded her. "Feel the need to pass out again?"

"No." She nudged me in the ribs with her pointy elbow. "Just don't expect me to bow down and kiss your Manolos. I've matured past that."

"Louboutins, and fine, I don't want your shiny lip gloss all over my pedicure anyway." I pulled away and wiped a stray bit of mascara from the corner of her eye. "You can be princess, next in line for the throne."

"Oh, yeah?" Lux laughed and blinked back a few tears – happy or sad, I couldn't tell, because they disappeared too fast. "Deal."

"Allons, there is a party going on that we should probably get back to, oui?" I pulled her to her feet and was impressed to see her modeling a pair of Guiseppe Zanotti peep-toes frosted all over with Swarovski crystal stripes that brightened up her turquoise dress, and whose silver details and went perfectly with her sequined Akris jacket. "Who put this outfit together for you? It is not a complete embarrassment at all."

"Se taire." My newly crowned successor acted her age for a brief moment by poking her tongue out at me, and I did the same in return because there was no one around to see.

When the light from the adjacent room flooded into ours before either of us had a chance to graze the door handle, our tongues promptly returned to their rightful places inside our mouths. Backlit in the doorway was the figure of a very, to put it in the very simplest terms, handsome boy in a dark blue suit with flashy white piping; I couldn't see his hair because it was slicked back beneath a matching black-banded fedora, which came complete with the sprig of little white feathers. I glanced over at Lux to see if she recognized the down home combination of his clear cut chin, lopsided smile, and straight button nose, but I could tell from the confused expression lining her own attractive features that she couldn't come up with a name either.

"Pardon me, ladies." A dimple appeared in his right cheek when he winked.

"Do you go to St. Jude's?" Lux had the presence of mind to ask.

"No," was his prompt, drawling answer. Laurel and Carolyn appeared on either side of him, giggling at each other as they shared some private and unheard joke. "Not yet."

I raised my eyebrows at their impropriety, but allowed the handmaidens their unbecoming moment of desperation – after all, he was quite agréable as far as being très beau went, and I now had the power to make them pay for the indiscretion in the new year, so why not let them celebrate the end of 2027 with a little champagne soaked fling? Lux and I edged around them, and the boy tipped his hat to both of us before wrapping his arms around the girls' waists and leading them over to the loveseat.

The door snapped shut behind us and I frowned thoughtfully. "What did he mean 'not yet'?"

"Ugh," Lux wrinkled her nose and gagged as though something unpleasant had slid across her tongue. "I don't know, but I hope Laurel and Carolyn give him crabs. _What_ a creeper."

"Lux!"

We linked arms and laughed all the way back to the bar to order a fresh round of cocktails, on me.

Lux stayed by my side for most of the evening, and when the captain of the swim team asked me to join him on the dance floor, I was careful to accept only after she had agreed to come with me. There was a television screen to the left of the makeshift dance floor broadcasting live footage from Times Square, where a lively and salt-and-pepper haired Ryan Seacrest was enthusiastically interviewing one of the night's musical acts. I had never watched the infamous time ball drop from the roof of One Times Square, and had been told it wasn't that much of a thrill, but something in me thought it might be fun to watch at least once.

The minutes ticked away, the music changed beat, and everyone fluttered from room to room in an attempt to see and be seen by everyone. People crowded around the center of the main room to try their hands at the giant mortar and pestle being used in the restaurant's annual mochi-tsuki celebration – the mochi rice would be pounded into soft cakes for soups and sweets, and used as an offering to ensure good luck in the New Year. While Lux dashed off to test her muscles, I passed on the tradition (I had neglected more than enough of my _own_ established la Saint-Sylvestre traditions to partake in a completely new one) and headed instead to the now mostly deserted bar for another refill on my martini glass.

"Merci beaucoup, Bonne Année!" I told the bartender with a wide smile. "Happy New Year."

He inclined his head slightly as he swiped his cloth across the counter. "Yoi otoshi o omukae kudasai."

"What does that mean?"

Someone slid an American bill across the bar to the girl working the cash register, and took the seat next to mine. "I wish that you will have a good new year. Give me a glass of Sapporo."

"Maverick," I said when he removed his leather jacket and tossed it across the back of his chair. And, because there was nothing better to open the conversation with, "You speak Japanese?"

"Barely, and not very well." The bartender slid a fresh glass into Maverick's waiting hands. "Enough to survive a layover at the Tokyo International Airport, anyway."

I had not seen or heard from him since kissing him on the cheek and leaving him on the dance floor in the Palace ballroom. He had been amidst the crowd of onlookers watching as my father and brother supported my weight and led me out into the night, but I did not know if he was privy to the details...or if he even wanted to be. Were we friends? Were we friends who shared personal information, or friends who sat at the same bar at parties and talked about why commercial airlines sucked? Or just two people who had gone to a society ball together once?

That line of thought put me in the very uncomfortable position of caring what he thought of me, a habit I had been trying very hard to break. After all, what kind of woman would I turn into if I always let myself be defined by the devilishly delicious-looking hommes in my life?

Ugh, but he was _tellement magnifique._

Non. Non, non, non, non. Non! As the newly christened Queen of Constance, I needed to...be good. To set an example for all the other girls to follow! I did not require un petit ami, especially not one who would expect me to wear a hair-flattening helmet and ride around on the back of his Harley-Davidson all the time. And besides, what did I really know about him except that he looked really good in a leather jacket and liked terrible music and lived at the end of St. Mark's Place, which was trendy enough but not very _fashionable_ and how did I know he didn't already have some public school fille panting over him back at his apartment right that second?

Aha! There she was. A dark-haired girl glided towards us and I remembered her as the lithe figure in a cream dress waving to Maverick from one of the upper galleries at cotillion.

My oddly victorious bubble burst the minute she drew close enough to hug him around the neck, and I could see that they shared a distinctly familial resemblance. She was several years younger than him judging by the roundness of her features and the slightly shaky hand with which she had applied her eyeliner, probably in the same year as Lux, and she possessed a terrifyingly contagious smile that did a lot to disguise most of their otherwise striking similarities.

Well, _'aha!'..._still! This was the little sister I had read about during the first stage of **Operation: Top Gun**. I hadn't known she was such a cute petite crêpe épaisse.

"Bonsoir." I leaned back in my seat so I could see around her Viking of a brother, who I assumed was going to introduce us just as soon as he finished gulping down his last swallow of beer.

The girl beamed, but did not do the courteous thing and extend her hand for an obligatorily polite _'how do you do'_ or _'it's a pleasure'._ Instead, she brought her right hand to her temple and then slashed it downwards in a sort of mock salute, which may have done her a lot of good at an army base under the tutelage of one of those stereotypically hard-as-nails generals who only wanted her to be all she could be, but I was someone much more important than that and all it did was betray the less-than-favorable result of her upbringing.

"I am Elle," I tried again, hoping a little prompting was all she needed to open up and be sociable.

But she just nodded, pink lips pursed primly together, her spiral curls bobbing in time with the motion. If she wanted to be a member of my inner circle, she certainly wasn't trying very hard.

I blew my bangs out of my eyes and went back to stirring my drink. C'est la vie, I had tried.

"Delilah wants me to ask if you're wearing perfume," there was a pause that lasted as long as it took me to look back up at them. "Sorry, _Vera Wang_ perfume. Better?"

My brow puckered together without my permission. When had she asked him that? "Oui, I am."

I blinked and watched Maverick and his sister exchange some kind of coded conversation consisting entirely of crisply exaggerated hand signals... Delilah looked directly at me as she brought her palm to lay flat against her chest, then in one sharp movement, she pressed her middle finger against her thumb with such a clear intention that I knew it _had_ to mean something positive. Unfortunately, communicating in sign language wasn't exactly my forte – I could pretty much spell my name with the letters of the alphabet, and a name that is spelled the same backwards as it is forward did not exactly seem like it would impress a native speaker.

"That means she likes it," Maverick relayed in a painfully bored voice. I got the feeling he didn't relish his role as translator.

"Oh," I tilted my head down towards my own hand and tried to mimic the motion she had made and commit it to memory. "Tell her thank – "

"She reads lips."

I looked back at her sunny, jovially unperturbed face, and mouthed a deliberate and slow 'thaaaaaank yooooouuuu'; it made much more use of my lips than saying it aloud in a normal conversation might have done. While she silently giggled at my minor faux pas (I could tell because her shoulder shook and the most wonderful featherlight crinkles appeared in the corners of her eyes), I pointed at myself and proudly presented my well-practiced E's and L's.

Instead of applauding my efforts, she wiggled all ten of her fingers at me and nodded in approval.

"Okay, okay," Maverick drained his glass and pushed it back towards the bartender for a refill. "What do you need?"

Instead of tuning out of their private half-uninterpretable conversation, I swirled my martini around in its glass and watched shamelessly. Maverick was shaking his head and repeating a series of gestures over and over again with more vigor every time, while his sister was doing a very good imitation of an earnest puppy dog as she held her right hand flat over her chest and made an insistent circular clockwise motion.

"What does she want?" I asked, peeking around Maverick's shoulder and shooting her a smile to let her know that whatever it was, I was completely on her side.

"Nothing," was Maverick's immediate answer, but Delilah shook her head adamantly, and pointed one slender finger towards a group of freshmen who seemed to be gathering their coats so they could leave as soon as the clock struck midnight. I wasn't surprised that the underclassmen had planned a little after party get-together at one of their own homes – there, without the watchful eyes of judgmental Juniors and Seniors they could gush over how _adult_ they had been at Scarlett Rose's party and openly congratulate each other on their teeny ensembles and brag about how well they had held their liquor.

"Ooh, an after party?" I saw Lux and Anneliese standing with a familiar-looking brown-haired bespectacled girl, who caught Delilah's eye and waved her over. "You are going to let her go, oui?"

"What?" Maverick seemed appalled at the very suggestion. "No, of course I'm not letting her go by herself. Delilah, go home and go to bed."

Delilah looked so spectacularly put out, and I had grown so very fond over her all of a sudden, I simply could not let him boss her around. "Of course she can go! It will be fun."

The pixie-like girl looked between the two of us and fraught lines seemed to spring up all along her forehead. She had a flair for the dramatic facial expressions, I had to give her that, but some day I would have to take her aside and teach her how to properly argue her case – with unwavering confidence, unshakable intelligence, steadfast logic, and quite a bit of blatant buttering-up, bribery, begging, extortion, or swindling (whichever was most appropriate to the situation). In her case, and since I did not have anything dirty childhood secrets of Maverick's to expose, it seemed pertinent to go with 70% steadfast logic, 20% unwavering confidence, 3% unshakable intelligence, and just 7% begging.

"Lux is going to be there and she will not let anything happen," I reasoned. Delilah stared at me with colors of disbelief, admiration, and utter terror dancing in her eyes. I sent her a reassuring wink. "If it gets very late, Delilah can even stay over at the Archibalds', they have plenty of empty guest rooms. If it will make you feel better, they can take my limousine for the rest of the night. The chauffeur will watch out for them."

All right, so that was a _petite, _VERY insignificant white lie. They would be taking Teddy's limo and I would definitely be doing penance for that later; but if it allowed the poor girl to have a fun night, it was well worth it and I could say, with all assurance, that I had done my good deed for the year. Elle Waldorf, patron saint of after parties. Patron saint of poor girls who don't know how to stand up for themselves and go to said after parties! Patron saint of getting their overprotective brothers to let them have a night of fun!

"Do you always push your way into other people's business?" Maverick's brow hooded his eyes, which were instantly dark and cutting. "No. Delilah, home."

Delilah's shoulders drooped, subtracting a good few inches from her willowy frame, and she kissed him on his cheek before turning on her heel to leave. All around us, people were turning to their friends in delight as the unruly crowd on the television began the raucous countdown from _dix, neuf, huit... _Even her glossy ringlets seemed to wilt.

When she was out of earshot – or, I suppose, eyeshot – I leaned against the bar and raised my eyebrows at him. "Do _you_ always order your sister around like a show dog?"

_Sept, six..._

"Goodnight." Maverick snatched his jacket from where he had flung it and swung it around his back to slide his arms through its black sleeves. "Happy New Year."

"You are _so _unpleasant!" I griped, crossing my arms over my chest as he drew another bill out of his pocket and put it under the empty glass and sopping cloth napkin.

_Cinq, quatre..._

"And you think you're a picnic, princess?" He quirked his stupid dimple right at me, which only served to make him more irritatingly attractive even as he insulted my every sensibility.

I huffed and lifted my chin in a pointed gesture of dismissal. "Non, I – "

_Trois, deux..._

All of the sudden, his calloused fingertips were burning white hot marks into the paper thin skin of my throat, and the way he teased the underside of my skin sent my neck arching back and stretched taut a cord of electric tension – the pressure point of which pulsed and ached just below my bellybutton. Then, he was so close that everything was sky blue eyes and the smell that assaulted my nostrils and made the hair on my neck stand on end was not Diesel Fuel For Life, nor any other cologne, not even aftershave. Just the crisp freshness a neutral soap provided, and something more musky than the dark base notes of some false scent, something raw and pure and... male.

_Un_.

He kissed me.

Hard.

When my chin was cupped in the crevice between his thumb and forefinger, he kissed me _so_ hard that my eyes didn't even have the good ladylike sense to automatically flutter closed.

I was seated, so I could not pull away, and the corner of the bar dug into my back with a bruising relentlessness. His free arm boxed me in against the wall, and I felt the warmth of his skin through his jeans where my knees dug into his upper thighs. Muscle memory is an overwhelming and powerful thing with the violent vigueur of a speeding freight train, and for a blinding instant I had the breathless urge to wrap my fingers around his collar and hook my spiked heels around his kneecaps to bring him tumbling down on top of me.

Thankfully, he had a little more restraint in that véhément moment than I did.

There was a cold breeze. And, when I pried my eyelashes apart, I was alone.

Bonne Année.

* * *

There wasn't much development for _this _story in this installment. If you don't know what I mean by that, I invite you to friend me on LiveJournal -- the link to my LJ is in my profile! More chapters coming after the New Year! Happy Holidays. xoxo

**Disclaimer:** I haven't owned _Gossip Girl _for 35 chapters, and I certainly don't own it or Cecily von Ziegesar's characters now. I did, however, create Elle, Lex, Scarlett, Saffron, Cedric, and mysterious-unnamed--fedora-boy, and my good friend Mibs is responsible for Teddy, Lux, Maverick, Julian, and Delilah.


	37. Love Under Key

**A/N:** I nicked some Ovid, but I doubt he'll mind. The lyrics/quote are/is La Rocca's. Enjoy!

"_I feel that look upon your face.  
You're thinking about some place where memories can be a way out  
of life that feels too spread out."  
_

**CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN**_  
Love Under Key_

Everything still felt like December when I twirled my way through the door and let it click shut behind me. The imported carpets were just as plush between my toes when I removed my shoes and thoughtlessly discarded them near the decorative tea table in the foyer. The furniture was arranged in precisely the same open-ended way when I strode right through the living area and the floor-to-ceiling view of Manhattan's electrified skyline. The stairs led to the same broad, dim hallway, and to my pretty new bedroom.

I had lived in several bedrooms throughout my sixteen years, but the one in Chuck Bass's penthouse was by far my favorite.

Because his room was just down the hall.

It was a good thing the staff was out celebrating the New Year in...whatever way hired help celebrated any holiday of significance. Probably with cheap confetti or those weird cracker things or a fire in a barrel. Regardless, it was a good thing they were out celebrating the New Year, because that put them someplace _else – _some place where they could not peek around the corner and watch me turn airy pirouettes across the marble tile.

I took the stairs at a brisk little flounce, the kind that makes a girl's satin Easter dress flutter about in wispy clouds of embroidered petals on crinoline underskirt beneath tulle overlay. In my stocking feet, it was easy to prance on the tips of my toes and, without a second glance around to make sure the place was _really_ empty, stop on the landing to clench my fingers around the railing and pretend it was the barre at my old ballet studio in Lyon.

The skirt fanned out and settled back around my hips and brushed against my legs when I glided down into a well-formed plié.

"_Eyes forward, back straight, chest out, stomach in,"_ the Madame would demand, rapping us sharply with a crop when we got out of form. Then, it had been a way to feel like a real lady, sophisticated and poised and pretty enough to paint a picture of.

At sixteen, it sounded more like the kind of advice that might lead to a real lady getting really kissed.

"Plié," I sighed, then shifted my weight to rise up on the balls of my feet. "Elevé. Battement tendu, devant, à la seconde, et derriére. Et rond de jambe."

I had once dreamed of becoming une danseuse étoile pour Ballet de l'Opéra National de Paris. Being a ballerina meant pretty dresses, and floating through the air on wings of gossamer; endless series of chaîné tournes, alternated with piqué and galloping chassé springing up into bounding jeté... Gravity was inconsequential, and sometimes it did not even exist.

But, had I known then that the very same feathery feeling of weightlessness and angelic splendor could be achieved merely through one heady New Year's kiss...

I would have given it up for martini-soaked make outs much sooner than nine.

My lips were pleasantly chapped, a fact I did not notice until I skimmed across the threshold of ma chambre and was descended on by an eager Moppet. I touched the delicate skin to see if any lipstick still stained them a glossy ruby red, and was a little smug to find that a certain midnight kiss of mine was very likely rubbing the same spot at that same moment and wondering how to wash it off.

"I would like to thank the Academy, merci beaucoup." I did a sprightly pas de bourrée, then spiraled into a flat-footed arabesque to sweep the silk robe out from under by haphazard bedclothes. A bubble bath sounded sinfully heavenly, for the first time in weeks. "Et, bien sûr, moi. Je suis fantastique."

The rejected party ensembles were still in their artless piles on my closet floor. I added to the mayhem with my patterned tights and triumphantly well-received cocktail dress, then perched on the edge of my eiderdown vanity seat to start removing jewelry and applying my faithful skin care regimen of washing, cleansing, toning, moisturizing, and masking – it was time to worship at the feet of the impeccable Renée Rouleau.

The reflection I saw in the mirror stalled my reach for ginseng and rosemary mint. I was enamored with the sight of myself, Narcissus kneeling reverently beside a lake to contemplate his own beauty. He gazed into the mirror-like water, and saw himself reflected in its tide. He knew not that it was his own image, but thought that he saw a youth living in the spring. He gazed on two eyes like stars, on graceful slender fingers, on clustering curls worthy of Apollo, on a mouth like Cupid's bow, on blushing cheeks and ivory neck.

It was a face I had seen once before in a photograph: a porcelain doll in a sturdy display case, her fading chocolate locks caught up in brilliant red silk. A painted smile between rosy moons, thick eyelashes and sparkling dark irises beneath finely arched eyebrows.

I looked into the lake and saw not Elle, but Blair.

The smile melted from my lips, but I did not wilt; I sat a little straighter on the pouf, my forehead puckered and pupils wide in the filtered light. The melted cocoa around them was not so very different in shade from hers after all, and neither was that sloping jaw – not when my mouth bowed upwards and parted to reveal rows of pearly white. My fingertips moved from bottles and lotions to brush across my cheeks, flutter down the column of my throat, sweep my bangs back from my brow.

And to think, I had once believed she was not my mother.

Believed it _ardently_.

Believed it so fiercely that I had been quite cavalier with precious years of storybooks, hugs that lasted mere seconds but stretched on for golden days,

Tiaras and pearls and sterling silver, painted toenails and fruity drinks with too many croissant sandwiches, new porcelain dolls the night before my birthday because she just could not wait to see the delight in my eyes.

A white silk headband from a specialty boutique when I was five.

Kisses on the forehead, secret smiles during Dorota's multilingual rants, stern punishments when I deserved it, desperate love with every breath she drew.

I leaned forward, my elbows bearing the weight on the vanity, and pressed the heels of my palms against my eyes.

"Maman," I called in a whisper, my voice as light as a sleepy child asking resolutely for another bedtime story. Had she been in the room with me, she would have heard as clearly as if my plea had rung from within the cavern of a grand cathedral bell. Maman would have bee at my back to press her warm hands into my shoulders and lay her secret kisses on the crown of my head. "Tu me manques."

I sank down onto my arms and buried my face in their solace.

"Je t'aime. Je suis désolé. Je t'aime, je t'aime, je t'aime."

Something hard met my hand when I leaned forward across hand carved gathered wheat and acanthus leaves. Then, with a clatter, that something hard met the ground. And before I could lift my head to survey whatever damage I had just caused to whatever expensive piece of cosmetic finery, the tenderly slow peals of a slightly off-key melody as a chipped ballerina tried valiantly to dance for her reflection.

"_Maman_," I had begged one night after the bittersweet conclusion of _Le Petit Prince, _my lower lip puffed out to enhance my depiction of a sad little waif. "_Teach me the words?_"

She had leaned across the feather down, her curls tickling my collarbone, and tucked the covers in around me with a sad, pensive look on her face.

"_It's time for bed._ Bons rêves."

"Sucre?" I had tried to sit up and pucker my lips for a nighttime kiss to send me down the stream to dreamland, but she put her hands on my shoulders and placed her kiss on the upturned tip of my wriggling nose. "_Sing me to sleep."_

Then, maman had reached across me to the bedside table and the same jewelry box that had crashed at my feet. Then, it had been brand new, with the sheen of personalized craftsmanship and the cleanly carved elaborately cursive letters _EW _winding and cutting across its glossy lid, and it had required a darling little key to unlock its treasures. Years later, it would suffer an accident much like the one that befell it that ungodly early New Year's morning, and the key would become useless; but then, when it was fresh and clean and delicately handled, maman had worn the key on a chain around her neck.

The lid had opened of its own accord, allowing me to see the vision of the jewelry box dancer in painted dresses with a ruby smile and diamond clear eyes.

The melody it sang had always soothed me, whether papère or grand-père hummed it to me when maman was out for the night, or whether I tried in vain to remember the notes when I was frightened of the dark or of the cold or of falling off my horse. It rocked me to sleep as the woman who gave it to me had once cradled me in the crook of her arms and done in the Waldorf nursery chair. It was my lullaby, and it always ensured bons rêves.

But, it had always troubled me that ma mère never stayed to sing it to me, or even to hum it. I had hoped that night that the magic of her birthday might infect her and prompt her to surprise me, but I was desolate as she rose to leave. Just as she always did.

"Please?" I had stuttered in my awkward, empty English. A last-ditch effort to pull her back into my glittering web and oblige me.

And she had stopped at the bedpost, then turned to smile at me. It was one of those times I could remember counting on one hand.

The mattress sprang underneath us when she jumped on top of the covers beside me and pulled me into her embrace. I had squealed and giggled with delight the way only a little girl who wants to stay up past her bedtime can manage, and she in kind had squeezed me so tight and pressed me against her chest that I felt the _thumpity-thump_ of her heart beating in time with the rhythm of her favorite song.

"Moon River," she had breathed when the tinkling tune caught up to her intentions. Her voice was a sweet breath of honey in the shell of my ear, and it had tickled my goose-pimpled skin with its almost inaudible wisp. "Wider than a mile, I'm crossing you in style someday. Oh, dream maker, you heart-breaker... Wherever you're going, I'm going your way."

And that was when the river ceased to be imagined, and came flooding forth from the corners of her dewy eyes. I twisted around in the downpour, a steady stream of one drop, then another, and another, reluctant summer rain. It was some incredible grown-up feeling that I could not decipher from the polished blankness of her stare – her eyes were on the same level as mine, but they looked straight through me into another place or time.

"Two drifters, off to see the world; there's such a lot of world to see."

Tears meant sad. I had deduced she was sad, because that was what tears were supposed to mean.

So, I had kissed her cheek.

And maman had shut her eyes, pained at the contact. The honey was sucked from her throat and her whispers were scratched and torn.

"We're after the same rainbow's end, waiting 'round the bend. My Huckleberry friend, Moon River..."

I cradled the misused jewelry box in my lap and gently thumbed away the film of dust that had settled over my initials. "And me."

I had once asked ma mère why the end of _Breakfast at Tiffany's_ always, _always, _without fail, made her reach for a handkerchief with which to dry her abundant tears. She had seen the movie easily a thousand times, could quote it silently and reverently (because she never dared speak above Audrey in her finest moments), idolized it, dreamed about it, lived it every day – it should have been old hat, just an entertaining story to admire and enjoy.

But something happened when Holly told Paul that she wanted to bring her little Brazilian kids back to New York someday, so they could experience the magnificence the city she loved. And when she threw Cat out into the torrential downpour, maman's eyes grew just as stormy and wet. And her lips moved along in synch with George Peppard's as his eyes lit on fire and he too went into that dark and flashing night.

"_Okay, life's a fact, people do fall in love, people do belong to each other, because that's the only chance anybody's got for real happiness."_

"Well, baby," she would sometimes advise, "you're already in a cage. You built it yourself. It's wherever you go. Because no matter where you run, you just end up running into yourself."

And it was clear. She did not just admire Audrey Hepburn or Holly Golightly or _Breakfast at Tiffany's._

Blair Waldorf _was_ _Breakfast at Tiffany's._ She not only lived it, but breathed Manhattan air and ate Cracker Jacks right out of the box and slept in a backwards tuxedo shirt and drank milk out of a champagne glass and bathed in the bathtub someone had cleverly crafted into a couch, and when she got the mean reds she hopped in a yellow taxi cab and went right to a quiet, proud place were nothing bad could ever happen.

And if she could just find a real-life place that made her feel like Tiffany's, then... she'd buy some furniture and give the cat a name.

I shut the lid, but the clasp did not click. The false bottom had come out of it, and I looked down at the same picture whose memory had so addled me mere moments before.

An ache replaced the uproarious heartbeat that had been resounding so beautifully in my chest, and all was a breath before the dawn and a gray lament.

I scrambled through the vanity drawers, looking for one of my new embroidered handkerchiefs so I could dab off my runny eye makeup and shrink into the bathroom for some mental recuperation. Why did I have so many shades of eyeshadow? And did one fille really need that many blush brushes? Being in America had really changed my values on the matter of concealer... What on earth was _that_ doing in my makeup drawer? Ew. I made a mental note to berate someone on the staff for not doing their job – whichever one I saw first, probably.

Maybe I hadn't left them in my closet?

As it was officially le Jour de l'An, I felt comfortable drawing up a mental list of mes bonnes résolutions. **Number 1: Be more organized!**

I dug through my armoire, which was full of all sorts of things that do not belong in a wardrobe, and fluttered my cracked lips in frustration. **Number 2: Get rid of some of my **_**stuff.**_

My knuckles rapped against something sturdy. Ooh! Christmas chocolates. That would most certainly help me feel better.

But, when I set the box on my lap and probed the edges for a seam, I realized that I had judged its shape too quickly. Its dimensions were too narrow and deep to be a conventional container of confectionery goodies. And, as I sat there with my back against the wall and stared down at the paisley-print white and gold wrapping paper, I could not remember touching a single sweet since the long-gone Fauchon macaroons (Mm, I would definitely need to remember to order some more of those since I was out...) with Serena, and that had been days before.

Serena. Speak of the angel, and she doth flutter from the glorious heavens in the form of a name on a wrapping tag.

**To: Ellie belly bo jelly**  
**From: Serena bean =)**

So _this_ was the package she wanted me to open when I was alone.

Which reminded me...

The whole place was empty, devoid of watchful eyes or well-meaning hallway lurkers, and Teddy popping in at the most inconvenient times, incessant phonecalls from would-be handmaidens who had gotten my number from someone else because _I _certainly wasn't the one arbitrarily handing it out like a flyer for a one day only multi-designer sample sale, et cetera. That meant I could finally take what I needed from daddy's safe and put it to good use, and that was what I really needed to do to get rid of the wrenching feeling in my stomach. I fisted a handkerchief against my palm and wriggled into my bathrobe as I patted at clumps of damp mascara and goopy moisturizer.

It was no time to _cry _like a pathetic little girl.

It was time to open a certain box. It was time to _do_, and do I was going to do.

And well!

Manhattan had to be that place – that place that made Blair Waldorf feel like Tiffany's.

At least, I hoped it was, not for the city's sake, but for the sake of the man who owned most of its most important buildings. Once, she had found solace and love and happiness in his arms, and I just knew she could be convinced to come back and join or family and make us complete, give Teddy a flesh and blood mother to hug and love and fight with and roll his eyes at. I deserved a chance to make things right, because I was after all just sixteen and couldn't be expected to make the best decisions.

And maman... maman deserved to have the prince I had always hoped would come for her.

The box would help speed that ending forward.

I padded across daddy's office in my wooly slippers and tapped in the numbers of their wedding date with the tips of my nails. The clacking sound the buttons made when they popped back up was deafening in the stillness that had fallen over the Bass home, and for a brief childish moment I felt something I had not felt since I was six years old. It was a moment of significance – like pushing apart Brazilian rosewood doors and gallivanting through a treasure trove of knowledge and enchantment, or turning over a photograph for the first time to see two smiling faces in love.

There were no white ribbons to tug nervously as I tried to savor the feeling, but I did remove the clip from my bun so my hair could fall loose around my shoulders.

It was odd that I should feel so sentimental about something I had seen before, a mahogany box with a gold clasp tucked in the very back of the safe, unassuming and unadorned. It was buffed to a stunning shine, which of course was the butler's doing, seeing as it was his duty to maintain the object that lay between velvet cushions inside it. The mahogany was interrupted only by a gilded clasp, which meant all I had to do was pop it open and –

"Now would be the moment when I ask what you're planning on doing with that."

There was a tumble of ice clinking against glass, then the splash of amber liquid filling in the cracks.

"But I won't insult my own intelligence. Or yours, for that matter."

Something at the stem of my brain told me that I should revolve slowly on the spot, brown eyes wide and doleful, pleading for understanding and a chance to explain my actions so that they cast me in the most flattering light. I should put the little box right back where I found it, snap the safe shut, and tell him he needed to change the combination before I was tempted to keep snooping around where my pointy little nose did not belong. I should be penitent, graceful, apologetic, angelic. Hell, even remorseful. I _should _feel like my hand had been caught in that pesky proverbial cookie jar.

But I never had liked clichés.

"Daddy," I walked around the desk so that it was not between us. "I thought you were still out."

"I came home early. Headache."

Then, daddy stretched his right hand out to me. I silently crossed the room to set the little mahogany box in his waiting palm.

We had both neglected to press the light switch. Me, because I had not needed any illumination but the stars flickering through the window; papa because...well, probably because he preferred to sit in the shadows just in case I too came home early and he needed to catch me in the act of breaking into his private safe to snatch a possession he held very dear because it was so very guarded.

Did he feel I had broken a trust? Was he angry with me? I could not tell because he had never been angry with me before. That pinched look on his face might just have been a normal expression. With ma mère, it had always been a stoic expression broken only by a telltale arch in her left eyebrow... Was his 'angry face' different with family than it was with members of the board or incompetent help? How was I supposed to know any of this?

Where was Teddy when I really needed his advice? Making out with his internationally beloved supermodel girlfriend! What a terrible brother.

"You get this from Blair, you know." He set down the tumbler of Scotch and recapped its crystal decanter, but the box stayed firmly within his grasp. "Scheming and plotting and planning, snooping around at all hours of the night."

He certainly did not _sound _furious or ready to kick me out into the bitter street. I tilted my head and studied him carefully. "Don't you have a private investigator on speed dial?"

Daddy's mouth quirked at its right corner, and he gestured to the wide open safe. "Who told you the combination?"

"No one," I said proudly, because I had come upon that information just as I had come upon everything else: by myself. "The 27th of December, 2010. The day you married maman."

His eyebrows knit together, which signaled his need to take a long pull from his glass. "And I suppose no one told you that either?"

"No one has told me anything, except you."

I bit my lip and moved to sit against the windowsill. The moon filtered through the panes and cast us in squares of silver.

And it all came spilling out.

"Dorota pretended she was deaf the one time I asked her. Nate told me he could not say anything. Aunt Jenny said she _would _not say anything, and neither would anyone else. Eric tried to help, but all he could do was get me invited to the cotillion so I could ask _Serena_, who turned out to be a no-show anyway. But then, it was okay, because you were there and then I was here, but mère is still there," I pointed in the direction of the East River, meaning France, but not articulating it very well, "I found a picture of you when I was six inside of maman's diary, which I learned English to be able to read, and then I Googled you and found you on Gossip Girl, and I came here to find you, and I found Teddy in maman's bedroom at Thanksgiving and found out he was a Bass and knew that he was my chance to get to you, and while we were in there I found a copy of the wedding picture in her vanity desk, and it said December 27, 2010 on the back. Oh, and I found the one in the antique frame behind the photo of... grand-mère?"

It was not so much a question about her identity as a trial to see how easily that particular title flowed across my tongue.

"And that was how I knew I was your daughter and not slowly going clinically _insane_, because I read the diary again and it all fit, and my middle name is Misty, and maman changed my name when I was little, and Teddy's middle name is Harold, so I had figured it all out before the ball, but I was not sure what to do. And there you were! Poof! Ta da! Like magic, just _there_ after ten years and I am obviously very happy about that, but... mère should be _here_ too, do you not think? Is there not something missing?"

Daddy pinched the bridge of his nose, then swept his hands through his hair and uncorked the decanter to immediately freshen up his drink.

"I take it back," he mumbled, his voice low and gravelly in the bottom of his throat. "You get it from me."

He removed his hand from in front of his eyes, and our gazes met.

"The ingenious part, not the emotional outburst part." Daddy closed the gap between us and sat next to me on the ledge. "_That_, you definitely get from Blair."

"Emotional outburst?" I repeated doubtfully. Classic Waldorf meltdowns were one thing, but true emotional outbursts were another. "Are we talking about the same Blair?"

The chuckle came from somewhere deep in his chest. It was earthly and musty, rife with age, because he let it sit there in the dust and mildew for years at a time without letting it breathe.

"Do you really want to use this?" He held the mahogany box between us.

Of course I wanted it. I had not traveled across the Atlantic Ocean, abandoned my Paris and my dignity and my life as I had always known it to go on a long-shot wild goose chase, and _succeeded_ in finding the man I had been dreaming of since I was six years old against most odds and the hindering wishes of others, to _give up_ when I was so close to fitting the last piece in to place at the heart of the jigsaw puzzle.

I was so close. All I needed was that little box and the even smaller thing inside of it, and all my unanswered questions would find peace.

But I bit my tongue and withdrew.

"Not if you do not want me to have it, papa."

Instead of applauding me for my moral standing and rewarding me with a big bear hug to show his approval, daddy rolled his eyes. "Don't lie to me."

"Accord!" I did not realize it was an instantaneous recanting until almost five seconds after the exclamation sprang out of my mouth. Daddy and his damned eyebrows looked at my belated throat-clearing and gracefully penitent nod with a little _too_ much smirking amusement. Rather than commenting on his smugness, as I so desperately wanted to, I sat as primly and straight-backed as I could, playing the part of a demure and patient daughter. "Je suis malhonnête, I really do want it."

He scratched the stubble on his chin and for the first time since he had made his presence known, I noticed that his bow tie was undone underneath his down-turned collar. The tuxedo jacket I had seen him in earlier that night was draped across the leather armchair across from the bar; it was not wrinkled or even loose in the elbows to imply that its owner had been out on the town and looking debonair, but as pressed and pristine as it might have looked in the garment bag it had been delivered in.

He was not even wearing shoes. When I did not smell the telltale musk of lightly applied cologne, I realized that daddy had not been out that night.

"Here," he said, thumbing the box open and removing the latchkey from its depths. "Don't tell anyone I've gone soft."

I shook my head reverently and accepted the little gold trinket when it was presented to me. "Never."

He pushed away from the wall and slid his fingers around the planes of his best Baccarat crystal on his way to lock tight (and probably reprogram the security passcode on) his safe. The key turned itself over between my palms, and I felt in its cold metal the thrumming opportunity to see what daddy secreted away in his bedroom, where not even Teddy or the maids or Moppet were allowed to go. Ever since the first time I had set foot in his private office and seen that taunting light on that then-imposing safe, I had dreamed up what kind of place Chuck Bass might consider a sanctuary, what things he might secret away in its dark corners.

The precipice I was standing at was a breathless one. Whatever I found in there could very well solve the mystery of what had driven my parents to keep an ocean between them for 16 years.

But with him in the room with me, like I had wished and prayed for him to be on many a twinkling star, even before I had known _he_ was _him_ and what that meant to me, it was hard to tear myself away. He had been _Chuck Bass _to me for so long, mythic and symbolic, shadow at the edges of my hopes and desperation, light at the forever elusive horizon, but now he was papa. Daddy. My father. Life was allowed to be romantic again.

We were very much alike, he and I; more so than I had surmised from our superficial resemblance.

"You kept track of us," I called to his back, referring to the collection of information he had accumulated in the safe, and he paused with his hand on its door. "Of me. All those years."

"Of course I did." The safe snicked shut and he cranked down its handle to secure it in place as steady green flickered back to blazing red.

I looked back to the glass book case that had struck such a chord with me the first time I had browsed its titles. Long had I wondered at what the purpose of those particular novels and books and stories might serve him, especially the macabre tales of that dreadful Edgar Allen Poe that had once cemented my belief that Chuck's one true love and beautiful wife must be really, truly dead. Now that I could reflect on it in the crisp dawn of a new year, I let my eyes run once again down the spines; _Les Misérables, The Fly-Truffler, Chocolat, Notre-Dame de Paris, Les liaisons dangereuses, _and many others. French provincial life, classics detailing the country's storied and vividly colorful past, entertaining modern literature.

He had really cared. And, since he had not been able to speak to me, he had read and amassed quite a library. He had gotten Teddy a French tutor when he was six.

Daddy had known we would meet.

I smiled, feeling watery again, and decided the moment had definitely come to tear myself away. I couldn't have him watch me crying again; once was enough.

Halfway between the hallway and his still form, however, I turned and clenched the key in my fist. The shadows draped across his face like well-cut cloth, and when he inclined his head in my direction to nod me off, the light played with the boundaries of his temple and gleaming eyes like a sudden and brilliant explosion of fireworks back dropped by inky black sky. He would have made a wonderful character in a film noir.

No wonder maman loved him so, because she _just had to_. Nothing would be right if Blair Waldorf did not love Chuck Bass.

The silk of my robe slid across my arms and prickled the little hairs that stood on end when I told him, in the truest tone I had ever spoken, "I love you, daddy."

Daddy's maelstrom eyes met mine, and that was when the river ceased to be imagined, and came flooding forth from the corners of my dewy eyes. His eyelids bit down on his lashes, bending them out of shape, but only for a moment and not to block me out – to inhale deeply and let go of the tense pull between his shoulders.

Then, I got my big bear hug.

The way maman had once kissed my forehead to tuck me into bed, daddy did so to encourage me to stay awake. The way she had stroked my hair as I laid despondently in her lap at the lowest point of my life, he did so with a true sunbeam of a smile as I laughed at the way all the breath had been knocked out of me as soon as his arms wrapped around my ribcage. He drew back to let me mop the tear tracts away and collect my dignity.

"I love you too, Ellie." Daddy squeezed my shoulders. "Now get out of here and snoop around before I start worrying about your health."

3 words, 8 letters. And I really finally had a father to say them to, who would say them back.

It is amazing what that can do for a girl's aching heart.


	38. Postcards From Far Away

**CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT**_  
Postcards From Far Away_

When I saw Paris again, from my comfortable position in my own cushy seat aboard the Bass jet, I silently apologized for the way we had left things. After all, it had not slighted me; it had never turned its back on me, lied, cheated, used, or abused me. It had simply been.

I had adjusted so marvelously in Manhattan, grown used to the sights and smells and the ebb and flow of obnoxious traffic, become tolerant of the company of exuberant Americans (and I begrudgingly forgave them their continent-wide misunderstanding of the word 'civilized'); perhaps because I had been born there, because maman had always been a New York City darling and daddy owned practically the whole island, or possibly because it did remind me a little bit of home.

In that it was nothing like it, bien sûr.

Je suis français. I had been raised by le Parisien ultime. A woman who had been born on the shores of America, but bred to live in Paris. L'âme de la France.

Just as I had _not_ been made to live there, perhaps she had. But we were there to convince her of exactly the opposite: that Manhattan needed her.

That _we_ needed her.

And we were not going back empty-handed.

_**24 hours earlier...**_

My heart swelled so much when that key slid into the pin tumbler lock, I felt as though I might be experiencing that oft-preached about coronary artery aneurysm Dorota had always warned me might strike me dead if I kept jumping on maman's mattress. If I had been unfortunate enough to be born with green furry skin, I could have been the Grinch – because the heartbeats were so loud as I pressed down on the door handle, it was very possible that my ribs might be in the way of a classic cartoon moment. The thought of my old Polish nanny berating my behavior broadened my smile and urged me forward.

For all her banding about, she would be proud of me for coming this far. For accomplishing my goals.

Daddy's bedroom door opened easily. It was almost anticlimactic, especially when I slipped through the available space between it and the doorjamb and actually saw how it looked on the inside. A king sized bed with attached nightstands on a platform, draped in cream covers and white pillows. Sleek, stylish, clean lines and a smooth finish in a rich wenge veneer, durable, beautiful. The wall it was anchored against was adorned with three black-and-white photographs that I would recognize anywhere, because they were...

___Le Baiser de l'Hotel de Ville, Un Regard Oblique,__ et ____Le velo du Printemps._

All three of them hung in maman's blue bedroom in Paris.

This was enough to convince me my quest had not been in vain. They were connected by much more than the archives of an internet stalker, the existence of Teddy and I, their friends that interwove and were also their family. The room was spartan, it served its purpose; utilitarian, a dresser with two drawers and windows that framed another spectacular view of the city. It wasn't at all what I had imagined.

The walls were white, for one. I had expected something in a dark oak brown.

His cologne was arranged on top of the dresser, next an odd circular sculpture, reflected in the oval-shaped mirror.

Obviously, I was confused. What was so secret about this room? It was boring. Stylish! But not anything other than a single father's bedroom.

As it turned out, the only thing of interest was in the master bathroom, sitting on the sink next to the towels and pomade. It was a long counter with two taps, and an empty corner where I imagined many things must have once been stored; cleansing gel, skin tonic, lotion, eye cream, facial masks, buffing beads, moisturizer, face wash, mousse, hairspray, parfum... the things you would expect to see littered near the woman's towels, opposite a rather barren side of aftershave and razorblades for their husbands.

Of course, daddy's side had no aftershave. ...It had cleansing gel, skin tonic, lotion, eye cream, facial masks, buffing beads, moisturizer, face wash, mousse, and hairspray.

And, a mostly full vial of No. 5.

Radiant, fresh, slightly metallic-waxy-smokey scent; waxy rose petals and orange peel. Blair Waldorf started wearing Chanel perfume when she turned 20, because that is what sophisticated women do. They move on from Dior and D&G and Vera Wang, and they channel Gabrielle. I had been raised on Chance and Coco Mademoiselle, Allure and Cristalle. Audrey and Chanel, little black dresses and big sunglasses.

I smiled again and picked the bottle up, noted how heavy it was with liquid. Had papa bought it to remind him of her scent?

Her smooth skin would flood my senses with Quelques Fleur when I hugged her after a terrible nightmare, kept my nose buried in the crook of her neck to inhale her essence and be calmed by it; jasmin, rose, lily of the valley, orris butter, ylang-ylang oil. Sandalwood on her wrists, patchouli oil behind her ears, oak moss and cinnamon bark.

There was something different about the space where it had been. Untouched. When I spritzed some on my left wrist, it smelled different under my nose. Time had corrupted it.

There was no hidden compartment in the closet behind daddy's suits. No box of treasures, no diary to spell things out. Only jackets, ties, trousers, suspenders, fine shirts.

I had wanted rows and rows of pictures, to see maman's ivory face broadcast from every available surface. Evidence. A letter she had sent confessing her undying love, an explanation for why she was a world away and could not bear to hear his name spoken at the lunch table. A tangible tidbit that would justify my weeks of searching, a thing to grasp between my fingers and know that I had done the right thing – that she could come back and that I could be the one to convince her to do it.

But there was only a bed. A dresser. A closet.

A dead end.

Daddy was still in his office when I went back to my room; I could hear him moving around behind the walls, but I did not stop to return the key. Why should he keep something so unremarkable locked up? It was a place for him to sleep and get dressed, nothing more or less, no more personal than any hotel room I had ever stayed in. Cold and empty, it displayed none of the careful details I had poured into the creation of my own chambre, which Lily Bass (as I had pledged to start calling her in my head) had helped me design. Pale walls, like daddy's own, delicate white details on the wallpaper, large windows with sweeping views hidden behind breezy white curtains. Sleek and uncluttered, special wood floors flown in from South America in a painstakingly selected shade that perfectly off-set my furniture.

It was pretty.

But I realized as I paused in the doorway, it was also empty.

There were no pictures of me and my friends to liven up the petit desk, no pretty painting of a mysterious and obviously French noblewoman to oversee my beauty rituals with an upturned nose. I had somehow neglected artwork, and therefore had nothing to define me socially. Maybe because I had no social definition, and therefore, had nothing to hang on my walls. Where was my film noir world, black and white, enchanting and doleful? _'Ma photo, c'est le monde tel que je souhaite qu'il soit.'_

I did not want to be like my room. I wanted my pictures from home. I wanted them on my new walls, so I could remember who I was._ 'J'l'adore celle-là, elle est trop bien.'_

I shed my robe, tired of the fact that it was pretty and really useless at providing heat, and let it drop. I would need to invest in something fluffier.

The unopened box from Serena was at my feet as I shimmied into a festive pleated black romper covered with pink and white heart-shaped confetti; it wasn't particularly warm or practical either, but it was adorable and reminded me of New Year's celebrations and midnight kisses, and that sent my heart back into a tizzy. Besides, I could always bundle up in a blanket if the heat failed to erase the chilling wind from my skin.

I nudged the present a bit with my toes, hoping the lid on the wrapping box would come undone and allow the gift to come tumbling out. If there was nothing of use in daddy's room (which I sorely thought he could have _told me_ in the first place and saved me all the sleepless nights and trouble!), perhaps I could find some entertainment in whatever my godmother had deemed worthy to gift me.

Ten minutes later, after the present had indeed come tumbling out of its wrapping and I had knelt down to examine its contents, I was ready to fully renounce my newly acquired reign over Constance Billard, and cast myself instead as the lead in an original tragicomedy about the most clueless person on the planet. Critics would rave about my realistic performance, praise my ability to bring a raving moron to life for thousands of adoring, mocking fans to throw tomatoes and other trade goods at.

To be fair, I never claimed I was a trained PI with detective skills worthy of Chuck Bass's speed dial; I had never aspired to be the emotionally detached Sherlock Holmes, to smoke his pipe as I analytically mulled over clues and then brilliantly solved them with infallible deductive reasoning. For one, smoking really bothered my lungs; for two, Sherlock Holmes had mauvais goût vestimentaire. I would never wear that silly checkered hat (unflattering much?) or his weird trench coat or even brown slacks, because slacks had never worked for me. Besides, I didn't even want to _be _a detective.

Pretending to be one was much more in line with my future plans. So, really, I could not fault myself for overlooking the ardent way Serena had urged me to open her gift. It was a rookie mistake, or something plausible like that; and besides, wasn't having The Big Answer right in front of you but ignoring it until the very last moment and solving the case at the end of the hour the crux of all prime time crime dramas? I was only following formula, like a good little gumshoe! My godmother's Christmas present had been the least likely suspect! Daddy's bedroom, the false one, and the fact that I had confused them, a final plot twist!

When I was through justifying my stupidity to myself, I sat on my ankles and stared at the collection of knowledge that stained the thick, cream-colored pages that had once been bound together in a thicket between fine Italian leather. The ink bled in black streaks and sprawled in looping cursive from margin to margin, top to bottom, in a careful calligraphy I had come to know and recognize as well as my own.

Maman's diary had always been incomplete, from the first time I had deciphered its foreign code and seen that its first page had been ripped out. Peppered between the pages detailing the annoyances of pregnancy, the terrific boredom that came with her arduous recovery in the hospital, the pain that sprang bittersweet at her departure from Manhattan, and the necessity of settling in with her father and his gay lover at their chateau in Lyon, there had been _missing pages._

Literally. I had seen the evidence in the form of their tattered remains. I had only been able to guess at what insights they might have provided, how much deeper those entries must have gone into Blair Waldorf's feelings or even the turn of events I had yet to riddle together. No phrases jumped out at me like they do in the movies when the heroine finds what she has been looking for all along; I could not hear la voix de ma mère calling to me from the past, narrating her life to make understanding it easier on me.

There was only paper. Paper, wood, and of course, photographs.

With maman, it was always photographs. High resolution stills from the major studio production that was her glossy movie life.

I gathered them into a pile and rifled through them, surprised to see not a succession of images from Teddy's childhood, or more snapshots from her own youth. These were pictures I could remember, because I had been beaming for the glistening lens when its light flared and popped and captured us together in Dorota's gardens at the house in Marnes-la-Coquette; on the beach in red bathing suits and big sunglasses, dark hair streaked with highlights that maman had called sun kisses; with papère, grand-père, grandmamma, et saba in Rotisserie du Beaujolais for my fifth family Thanksgiving dinner; me riding on Nate's shoulders at the Van der Bilt estate while maman stood nearby, shading her eyes as the wind whipped her hair beneath a cloche hat; the two of us sipping tea from my miniature set, surrounded my porcelain dolls.

Everything I treasured about my childhood was cataloged in those images.

A note had landed on top of the pile of assorted diary entries, written on pale, thin paper, in fresh hand.

_Ellie, _it read in blue, not black, ink. _Tu es mon plus cher trésor. Je suis désolé pour ma peur. Lire et comprendre. Je t'aime._

Read and understand. Read, and _understand_.

So far, 2028 was shaping up to be a highly emotional year.

From that hour on, I became very methodical about everything I did. When piecing together a time line did not work within the confines of my own head, I fished the diary out of its hiding place and marked the places where there were obvious gaps between entries. Then, I went to pull a sheaf of paper out of my desolate book bag so I could compose a list of everything I knew; as a Parisian, this task should have been much easier to accomplish than making a list of things to do.

But, it was not. Being in Teddy's presence had not improved my list-making abilities in the least.

When all seemed hopeless and the sun was peeking at me from over the hidden horizon, I was ready to give up. My bed seemed to actually be speaking to me from across the room, which I took as a sign of sleep deprivation and therefore insanity. The heat being generated by my little fireplace had become both stifling and soothing; intoxicating, it transported me to warm winter nights beneath enormous fleece blankets, my head resting on maman's shoulder while her chin settled comfortably atop my hair. Roman Holiday faded from the screen, and somewhere in the back of my mind I sensed the music stop and felt Dorota's footsteps fall lightly on the floor as she bustled about and tidied up after us.

Maman had the softest skin of anyone I knew. Like feather down on the most delicate silk charmeuse, it cradled my cheek and brushed aside my bangs when they fell in front of my eyes. I was getting over a scarring bout of varicella zoster virus (la varicelle, or in English, chicken pox) which to me then had sounded like a great villain from one of my fairy stories. This was because maman had done as she always did and dressed up the matter in a pretty tale to soothe the blow:

I was Thumbelina, seeded in a barleycorn and hatched from the folds of a tulip, and was married to my perfect flower-fairy prince. We flitted from bud to bud on gossamer wings and tripped across beams of light, our dark hair fluttering behind us on tendrils of satin wind.

The fiery beast La Varicelle, dressed all in red and bearing a nasty, crooked nose and beady, watering eyes, had attacked our peaceful kingdom and demanded tribute in the form of me, the fairy princess. A kingless queen from the West saved my life by casting a spell on La Varicelle's wand; I would suffer in place of my subjects for seven days and nights, and on the eighth day, I would rise back up stronger than before and eradicate La Varicelle from my kingdom forever more.

Maman herself put salve on my pockmarks and tied gloves to my hands to make sure I did not scratch and mar my pretty little doll's face. Then she stayed up with me through the feverish, aching, cranky nights and forced me to eat Dorota's best chicken noodle broth while we watched movies and read books and sang songs. She did not go out with friends to gala events or allow those same women to set her up on dates with handsome bachelors; instead, she stayed in her pajamas and took baths with me, brushed out my hair, dabbed the salve back on the spots and gave me ibuprofen. Told me I was the prettiest little girl afflicted by la varicelle that she had ever seen.

That picture of us sipping tea had been taken by Dorota. My porcelain dolls sat untouched in the background, but maman was more beautiful and porcelain than any of them. I was a gracious hostess, greeting her with a perfunctory kiss on both cheeks, chatting with her like a real grown up lady about the weather, the petit fours, my stuffed animal collection, and my opinion on the state of European politics (my take on which she had found to be quite amusing, since I had compiled it by eavesdropping on conversations in many bistros and boutiques). She taught me that the lady always leaves the table with a little bit of an appetite, to take little bites and tiny sips.

"Une dame ne laisse jamais les gens voient son plaisir."

I asked her to tell me a new bedtime adventure, when the stories of fictional princesses and their heroic knights grew stale. She hid a smile in the right corner of her mouth and sipped her tea for an extra long time, to make me think she was mulling the idea over. I tried to sit up tall, my hands perched in my lap, and not fidget, but the anticipation rose with every little quirk I saw or imagined dancing across her lips.

"Maman!" I implored, and she weaved the tale out of twinkling pixie dust and piping hot chocolate.

A queen with dark hair and red lips, who ruled her subjects with a well-clad iron fist: a comely golden sun sprite, a dashing and handsome knight, an insolent servant girl who tried to usurp the throne but became a seamstress instead, a gaggle of handmaidens who did her will in the light of day and plotted her downfall in the shadows of her own castle, an array of princes who danced across her field of vision but never seemed capable of keeping up with her.

That day, instead of inquiring about a prince, I asked after her king. "After all," I said, well informed on the issue, "every queen needs a king at her side to help her rule."

Maman pursed her lips, her doe eyes wide and thoughtful as she crafted her response. "The queen had a king, and they helped _each other_."

"Did they love each other very much?" I wondered. She reached out to keep me from itching and threaded my fingers between her own.

"Oui, of course they did." Her lips cradled one of those smiles that I had been able to count on one hand at the age of six. "They were madly in love and everyone knew it, even if some did not approve. Their love was not like other people's, you see; it was not quiet, or friendly, or beautiful like the kind you read about in the storybooks. Their subjects looked at them in fear and reverence, and sometimes it was said that the king and queen seemed to be on fire."

"On _fire_?" I breathed in awe.

Maman put my head on her lap and buried her fingers between my limp tresses. "Not literally, ma petite. But they were so madly in love that it consumed them. And during their reign, they surprised the whole kingdom when the queen announced that le petit prince et la petite princesse would soon be moving into the castle nursery. The king and queen were very young, but madly in love, and forged ahead through the many months they had to prepare before their son and daughter joined them. It was not long, however, before the queen became very ill, and she was soon bedridden."

"Like me?" I wondered, giddy at the thought that a queen could get sick just like me.

"Not exactly like you, chérie." She pulled my right hand up to her lips and peppered tickling kisses across my glove-covered knuckles. "But she too had someone to feed her when she did not want to be fed, to stroke her hair out of her face when she was feverish in the darkest parts of the night, to hold her and soothe her and assure her that everything was going to be all right."

"She did? Oh good." My eyes lit up and I turned on my back to gaze up at maman's face. "Who was it?"

"Her king, of course. He never left her side. He was so faithful and vigilant, that even the most persistent of his naysayers began to think he had changed his ways. For you see," maman adjusted her legs beneath me, clearly easing into the unfolding yarn. "The king had not always been a good man. In fact, he had started as a dark, ominous presence in the kingdom. Many thought he was destined to be a villain, cloaked in black and dallying in the shadows. But the queen was his perfect match in every way, and he hers, and they came together to scheme against –- " here, she paused to clear her throat and shake her head a little, "to fight off their enemies."

I gasped and gripped her left hand, which I still held within my grasp. "Like who?"

"Oh, they had many enemies, for people are always envious of their betters. They will always scheme amongst themselves and try to take over."

My lips fell open again as I related her words to my own experiences. "Is that why Marie pulls my hair all the time?"

"Mais oui, ange précieux. She is green with jealousy, and so is her tramp of a mother. The queen had to contend with many such loathsome, covetous fiends who sought her downfall, and her grave illness was their chance to strike. Luckily, the knight and the serving girl, who had become an ally after much tribulation, along with a scribe and the golden sprite were with the monarchy, and aided the king as he strove to find a cure for his beloved. He called upon the best physicians in the land, and they traveled from far and wide to inspect the queen; they prescribed many tonics and remedies, but none were safe for her. The king was, above all, most concerned for her safety."

I sighed and closed my eyes against her stomach. "Tellement romantique..."

"It was not so romantic for him. He was frantic, but he hid it well. The king was the bravest man the queen had ever known, and he suffered silently for her. And when the little prince and his sister came, the queen grew even worse. The physicians had her put in a facility, and the prince and princess were forced to stay there with her, for her sickness had infected them and made them weak. The king was at the end of his rope, fraught with worry for his little family. The subjects waited outside to hear the news, because the public loves a good tragedy. The sprite alighted from the sun and bore the twins gifts: a teddy bear, a little doll, because they reminded her of them. The knight brought the prince a toy sailboat, the princess a plush horse, because they would grow to ride the wind and sea and see the wide world. The seamstress brought clothes, to keep them warm because they were separated. The scribe came with the sprite to read to them. A loyal subject and his partner arrived to watch over them all. The queen's mother and the rest of her family set up vigil nearby."

My lids were heavy, maman's words rocking me to sleep, but I could not miss the end. "What about the king's maman et papa? Where was his family?"

"The king's whole family was there with him, slipping away into nothing." Maman's answer was sadder than it ought to have been. "He himself almost wasted away at their bedsides."

"What happened?" I asked, worried, as always, that the story would not have a happy ending.

Ma mère squeezed my hands and lowered her voice to a whisper. "And the queen got better, and so did the prince and princess. And they all lived... Elle?"

I had fallen asleep.

"Elle, wake up." A hand shook my shoulder in an effort to stir me from my comfortable slumber. "Come on, Elle. You're on the floor. And I think you're drooling a little bit."

That statement was just preposterous to pry my eyes apart; I sat up as soon as they passed through my ears, mouth open to argue and insult whoever had dared to utter them, when I realized whoever it was had been telling the truth. Then, I blinked and sat up, noting that the sun was a blinding beacon just on the other side of my window, my neck was quite sore from being bent against the frame of my bed for however long I had been dreaming, and that my twin brother was squatting next to me and looking way too amused. At least he didn't have a camera; if he had been Cedric Humphrey, my unflattering portrait might have been polluting the internet in seconds.

"Shut up," I ordered, dabbing my mouth with the back of my fingers and muzzling a huge yawn by clamping my teeth together. "What time is it?"

"Just after seven," Teddy answered.

I arched my eyebrows at him, and he took on the appearance of an overzealous sunbather in moments. "You're just getting in."

He tugged on the collar of his Gucci suit and shrugged, joining me on my hardwood floor, a significant part of which was still cluttered with the pages I had yet to actually read. He shed the jacket and tossed it carelessly over his shoulder so that it landed somewhere on my fluffy rug, and picked up the note maman had sent along with the little box. While he read it and tried to figure out exactly who it was supposed to be from, I instead examined the vessel it had traveled across the Atlantic in. Handcrafted, engraved with brass work, a stunning design of etched flower and pearly leaf, 8 inches deep and more than capable of holding all of maman's secrets.

___I didn't stop running until I appeared in maman's bedroom doorway, and saw her snap shut an old box and lock it in her bedside drawer._

"This is..." I looked back to Teddy, whose face was puckered and drawn. "This is from...?"

"Maman." I nodded and looked down at the pathetic list I had been trying to compose. "Can I have your help?"

He took the pen and paper when I handed them to him, and wordlessly agreed to jot down a sequence of events as I read the diary entries aloud. It was as emotionally detached as we could make it, even though occasionally I tripped over a sentence or stumbled over the name Charlie, but we made it through in two pieces. The task of rereading all of the facts we had already managed come to uneasy grips with had been easy, though, compared to the mission we needed to undertake: Sorting the new pages and pasting them in their proper places.

It would not due to read everything out of order. I might misconstrue something maman had written, and I never wanted to do that again.

The pages that were headed with dates were easy to sort, but it was the entries she had cut off and ripped in half that were difficult to piece back in. And when luck finally struck its claim with us, and everything began to unravel in front of our eyes with such clarity that we could almost see the events physically unfolding, little shiny bits and dusty baubles were clasped together and linked with chains I had never even imagined.

The first was_ '____Then there's my mother, pestering me to know who the father is. I've just been telling her that I don't know, which is true.__' _As an eleven-year-old girl I had assumed that was the end, never once registering that her name was not signed at the bottom of the page. The entry she had ripped out had been precisely penned, a heart-wrenching account of how far away she felt from Chuck Bass sometimes_ – ____'it's like he doesn't even see me in the doctor's office, but an apparition of his mother haunting us in the corner.'_

___'He is a different person in those moments, so gaunt and lifeless that it reminds me of that day in the courtyard at school. I gripped his chin and looked into his eyes and saw nothing in them – and I asked him who he was, and he just stared at me. He wasn't mine, anymore, he didn't belong to me; he belonged to the ghosts.'_

The outrageous and graphic condemnation of mon papa and his reproductive organ concluded with ___'That made me feel better. I hate hormones. I wonder when he'll be home tonight? I miss him.'_ At seven, I had been too mentally scarred to continue reading, but if I had, I would have read a concise summary of maman's deep and all-consuming love for père.___ 'When he is holed up in his office poring over paperwork or the board kidnaps him for one of those ____forever long____ business meetings, I feel like I'm wasting away and nothing will be right again until he comes back. It's awful and unhealthy, but I love that heartless son-of-a-Bass evil Basshole Basstard mother Chucking spawn of Satan. When he walks through the door, his heart comes back and the sunset becomes sunrise._

___Tell anyone I said that, diary, and I will deny it. I am a Waldorf and no man defines me._

___(Except Chuck. UGH!)'_

Teddy was the one to locate a home for:

_'____Teddy was. It is so difficult to write his name, even now, even when Chuck and Serena and Nate have all assured me that he has become the picture of health. Chuck offered to send me pictures of him as I have assured him I will do with Ellie, but to see his little face would just be a stabbing reminder of what I gave up. I told Chuck that I don't want to steal any piece of that little boy until I can call him ____mine____ again. Chuck and I aren't going to talk on the phone anymore until he can say the same about me. I changed my cell number, and so has he. I felt like vomiting when we hung up, but I promised him that I have given up that vice for good. That was what this diary was for in the first place, wasn't it?_

___I know the doctors said it was nothing I did. I know that, but God if it didn't all feel like my fault. And that I put Chuck through that... That he sat there for months and months and blamed himself, and his father, and the Bass name, and not once did he ever blame me... He told me he loved me when he hung up the phone, and I wanted to vomit and die, and then I looked at myself in the mirror and saw Ellie's crib in the reflection, and I realized his is the smartest man in the world, really. I am not worthless or unworthy. I have my little girl, and she ____is____ mine no matter how much she feels like Chuck's._

___No, that is wrong. She is ours, and so is Teddy. But he isn't mine, not yet. I wonder if I'll regret these lost years in the future, but I doubt it. I am not a good mother for him yet. I refuse to ruin him the way Bart ruined Chuck. But Ellie... maybe Chuck was right, perhaps it will help that she is my little Eleanor Waldorf and the chance to make amends for all those dysfunctional years on 5th Avenue._

___Mother thinks I'm being ridiculous, and she has said so very loudly any time I am around to hear her. Cyrus doesn't agree either, but he respects my decision, even though his unsolicited advice has succeeded in making me feel like a raging bitch on more than one occasion. Everyone disapproves, really. But at least Serena understands and Nate is supportive, and Ellie is here. So little. So dependent on me._

___I will not let her down. And someday, I will hold Teddy again and look into those big brown eyes that are so much like my own and tell him he is mine. My Teddy. My Teddy bear.'_

With suspiciously glassy eyes, he tucked that page between___ 'I love this little girl so much, I want to watch everything. Her little toes, her chubby little elbows, the wrinkles in her fingers, the angel softness of her pale little stomach. She's just so little. Even more little than - ' _and ___'We should call her ma petite all the time. It can be her nickname. Ellie, ma petite. Petite Ellie.'_

The sun filtered through the windows, then it vanished overhead and our business was illuminated only by the lamp on my desk across the room. By the time our stomachs began rumbling and the smell of lunch would usually have wafted up from the kitchens and pervaded my candle scented air with whiffs of promising assiette de crudités, bitter coffee, and tantalizing tartes, we sat together in the gray-blue light and looked at our 20-year-old mother's thoughts, feelings, and scathing commentaries all tidied up and tucked away inside a cover and a back, and marveled silently at how so much information could be packaged in so small a journal.

"Wow," Teddy breathed, and I silently agreed. Wow.

"She loves him," I said after we had stewed together in silence for quite some time. "Or she wouldn't have sent me this. She wants to come home."

"I don't know, Elle," Teddy was uncertain, fidgeting with his white sleeves until they were rolled back over his elbows. "Maybe she was just trying to – "

"No offense," I interrupted without thinking, "but I think I know her a little better than you do."

He sucked in a breath and even I, through empathy or some odd twin osmosis, felt as if I had been punched in the gut.

"I am so sorry," I amended, not too proud to admit that I had been out of line. Had our places been reversed, had he been sitting in my room in Passy while maman sat in her bedroom a few doors down as we worked diligently at helping each other understand the past that had led Chuck Bass to be absent from our lives, had we gone through all of that together and had he still taunted me with the fact that I did not know my father while he did... I would have probably thrown vases and screamed accusations and made an enormous scene.

Teddy was much more graceful than that. His throat worked violently and all the words he wanted to say thrust against his tongue for permission to burst out, but he just nodded curtly and we moved on.

Moved on to form a plan that would lead us, a mere day later, to maman's doorstep in the 16th arrondissement, our fists poised and ready to knock.


	39. Hometown Glory

**AN: **The song lyric is from Adele's song _Hometown Glory,_ for which this chapter is named. That takes care of all the disclaimer-y mumbo jumbo. Thank you so much to all my wonderful, wonderful reviewers, I love all of you so much and am so grateful to read your comments and critiques. For those of you that have been here since the beginning, and all the people have joined along the way, only one more chapter before the epilogue!

xoxo

"_I like it in the city when two worlds collide."_

**CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE**  
_Hometown Glory_

It was not until Teddy slipped out of my room and into his own to "find a better notebook" in which to properly catalog our growing base of information, that I realized I had not moved from my spot on the floor. It certainly explained the twitches of pain in my lower back, not to mention the stiffness that had settled in between my shoulders. Before I took a look at the spare sheaves of paper that had not fit inside the now fully reconstructed diary, I sat up on my knees and gathered the collection into one easy-to-peruse pile, then took the time to actually pull my bedclothes across the width and length of my queen-sized mattress.

Moppet emerged from her little palace and leapt onto the comforter to position herself atop my feet. I scratched her ears with one hand, while I used the other to flip through what my brother and I had discovered to be unsent letters, all of them addressed to Charles Bass, 795 5th Ave, New York, NY 10065, from Blair Waldorf – made returnable to the chateau in Lyon; the mansion in Marnes-la-Coquette; 36 Rue George Sand 75016 Paris, France. All of them bore their original stamps, and none of them had been sent through international mail.

I figured they must have been written after maman and daddy changed their phone numbers to eliminate contact; they were still more proof that she had loved him all this time, but kept herself away. Her private words were sufficient studies in all of the reasons: _those people aren't alive anymore_ read one of the entries; _he's in love with a girl in red lipstick, on a stage that doesn't exist anymore, wearing a slip she tossed out years ago_ read another.

Clearly I needed to talk to ma mère. They were both very _much_ alive, obviously, and she wore red lipstick more often than I could remember her _not_ wearing it. Her closet was full of slips, and I had been to Victrola with Teddy and seen for myself that there was definitely still a main stage for burlesque dancers to traipse across.

Teddy owned it, had been in charge of its operations since his 16th birthday the previous June, but it was still part of Bass Industries, and daddy still approved the dancers. Most of them were small, lithe, graceful, and danced to thrumming music while their thick curls of brown hair bobbed with them. I wished, fruitlessly, that they had just _talked to each other_ at some point and done all this heavy lifting for me. It was very exhausting trying to figure out just what had ended their marriage and cast me and my twin on separate sides of the Atlantic Ocean.

I thought of Paris, and it got me thinking about other things. How Teddy had never spoken to his mother or gotten to appreciate their similarities, how I had never hugged my mother and my brother at the same time, how Teddy had never been to Paris, not even to grandmamma's Île Saint-Louis holiday home.

The letters were full of longing – maman wished Chuck had been there to see me smile or see me walk, or see me take a sip out of a real cup for the first time, and how she desperately wanted to see Teddy do those things too. Some were less innocent, but I pretended those did not exist and shuffled them to the back of the pile. Others were just about her day: what she'd had for breakfast, the people she'd met for tea, the color of the sky, and what outfit she had worn.

The plan began to form even before Teddy rejoined me with a fresh spiral and a fully inked pen. As he sat at the end of my bed near Moppet and began sketching out everything we knew (maman and daddy were married on December 27, 2010 when maman was 3 months pregnant; Serena and Nate were our godparents; they had separated and divorced; daddy had sent me to live with maman and she had changed my surname to her own; maman had started the diary because of a second battle with bulimia, et cetera), I reached for my own paper and pen and began composing travel plans.

"What are you doing?" Teddy looked up from his list when he had to turn the page, and caught me. "Are you making a list?"

"Oui. A to-do list."

He stared at me in disbelief. "You?"

I nodded, feeling equally surprised. "Je sais."

"What is it?"

"Our itinerary for Paris, of course. How do we get the Bass jet ready without daddy knowing?"

Teddy took care of the technical details – calling daddy's pilot and discovering there was a business flight already prepped to take off that night, but we would need to catch the helicopter at Pier 6 and have our luggage and passports at hand for the touchdown at Charles de Gaulle. Since we had a staff at hand to pack our bags for us, and a full-time chauffeur ready to drive us anywhere we wanted to go, this scenario presented just one problem: my passport was still wherever Nathaniel Archibald had locked it up, along with my birth certificate.

I had suspected for a long time that my birth certificate had my former name printed on it, and that it had been hidden from me for years. Since there was only one place where Nate Archibald kept his valuables, I threw on a discreet pair of skintight designer blue jeans, a loose-fitting light grey sweater, and matched my pointy black boots with a fedora and sleek sunglasses and called my own white limousine around to the front of daddy's hotel. On my way out, I slung an oversized slate colored Chanel scarf around my neck and snatched a navy blue blazer from the front hall closet as I piled my essentials into a gold Ferragamo hobo.

By the time I got to the curb of E 61st St, Suzanne was stubbing out her cigarette and holding open the back door.

"Merci," I said, sliding into the toasty backseat. I was referring more to the dying cigarette than her required courtesy, but she winked at me and shut the door without a cheeky word.

In truth, I could have walked from The Pierre to the Archibald townhouse, just 13 blocks uptown, but it was cold. Also, I wanted to have a quick getaway in case Jenny tried to coax me into staying with her damned delicious hot cocoa and stupid big blue eyes. It was hard to be mad at her for keeping her mouth shut when I slept under the same roof as Chuck Bass, but part of me wanted to separate myself from both her _and_ her husband until the divorce was finalized and their lives had fallen into some sort of routine. Lux and Lex needed to know that I was firmly on _their_ side in all of it; I was only stopping by to pick up something that belonged to me.

Thankfully, Jenny was out for business, and it was Julian who opened the door. He and Lex were humoring Lux by joining her for a screening of her new favorite movie, _The Life and Times of Rosie the Riveter, _a follow-up to her previous favorite of one week _Men Don't Leave._

"Thank God," Julian breathed, even going so far as to pull me across the threshold and into a big bear hug the likes of which saba would have been impressed by. "She's driving me insane."

My best friend had, as she had told me over and over again the previous night, rediscovered the Van der Bilt dynamo within and, urged forward by what she perceived to be her older brother's new life as a young gay man in New York City, had become a devotee of civil rights activism. Feminism was her denomination de jour, and I foresaw many rants about equality and the demeaning way men liked to stare at her mile-long legs. I had my default eye roll all geared up.

Lex's head appeared around the corner and he, too, looked relieved to see me. It was clear that the two of them had raced from the living room to see who could escape the television's glow first, and my god-brother had lost. "Are you staying? Please tell me you're staying. We have cake?"

"De rien," I said, genuinely sorry for their plight. It would be best for me to sneak upstairs to Nate's study and retrieve my travel papers without disturbing Lux's religious rites.

A loud _thunk_ accompanied Lex's forehead colliding with the wooden door frame. Julian wrapped his arms even tighter around me and lifted me off the ground to prevent my departure.

"I love you both terribly, but I have a plane to catch." Lex arched an eyebrow at me as Julian tilted my chin up with his spare hand and did the same. "A jet, actually."

"Then what are you doing here?" Lex came all the way around the doorway and crossed his arms over his chest. "If Lux kidnaps you, you'll never escape."

I nudged Julian with my knee, and he reluctantly set me down on my own two feet. "I need to know the combination to your dad's safe? He still has my passport."

"Oh," Lex pinched his forehead together for a moment as he tried to recall the numbers. Julian took this silent opportunity to wrap his arm around his boyfriend's shoulders and kiss his temple, and the two of them were just so adorable that I wanted to squeal and stay with them forever, but I had important business to attend to. They would simply have to wait. "071490, I think. At least, that's what it was the last time I broke into it."

"Merci beaucoup."

I blew the two of them a kiss and took to the stairs. Before I turned into the first landing and opened the second door on the left, I heard Julian heave a heavy sigh and then the tell-tale noises of a happy young couple making with what, as Lux called them, the smoochies. I smiled wistfully, turning the doorknob and remembered _my_ last incident of lip-to-lip action as clearly as if Maverick Sparks had been waiting for me at the the base of the staircase. All lips and eyes and that delicious natural musk...

The sight of the Archibald safe snapped me back to daylight and I quickly retrieved what I needed from within its carefully organized depths. My fingers itched to open a few of the velvet jewelry cases and take a peak at what Jenny stored away for special occasions, and it wouldn't hurt to take five minutes to peruse all of the little files to look for something of interest – I slammed the door shut and pressed down on the knob, wondering just how long it would take to break the detective habit. I chanted to myself that there was nothing else I needed in there, and it would be rude to get my fingerprints all over the Van der Bilt diamonds, and I did a few breathing exercises I had learned in my drama classes, and the urge passed.

I managed to avoid Lux on my way back through the front door, and was privately thankful that Lex and Julian had not turned the foyer into another public baisodrome – I was ecstatic that they were together and that I could go out for drinks with them at the same time and feel jealous of their preciously transparent intimacy, but that did not mean I was any more keen to witness either of their tongues down either of their throats. Once had been more than enough.

The file containing my travel papers 'happened to fall open' in my lap once Suzanne had turned the limousine around. I gazed down at my passport for less than a second before brushing it aside to view my birth certificate – both of them. The one on top read the standard ELEANOR MISTY WALDORF that I was used to seeing on school records, in the folds of junk mail back in Paris, and hearing from Dorota whenever I accidentally forgot to neatly fold my washable laundry in the hamper.

But underneath, on the same paper, printed in the same font: 'This is a certification of name and birth facts on file in the Bureau of Vital Records, Department of Health, City of New York. Date of Birth: JUNE 11, 2011. Borough: MANHATTAN. Name: ELEANOR MISTY BASS. Sex: FEMALE. Mother's maiden name: BLAIR WALDORF. Father's name: CHARLES BASS.'

There it was, written – or typed – in black-and-green. I somehow felt that I never needed to see it to know it was true, but it was nice all the same.

_Eleanor Misty Bass_.

I zipped everything back up when the limousine came to a stop back at The Pierre. The doorman already had the front doors open for my swift walk from warm to cold to warm, but something about the bare trees across the street, the quiet way pedestrians hushed their way to and fro along the border of Central Park, coupled with the crisp quality of the thick city air, made me feel like taking a long walk. My valet would have everything pressed and packed long before Teddy and I departed for downtown, and the maid would give daddy our letter explaining why we were going on a short trip upstate to visit the Lifton family's Long Island estate.

It was all planned, all my brother and I needed to do was be at the helipad on time.

Which is exactly why I took the detour to inhale the current of brisk wind as I wandered the paths that stretched and and turned beneath a canopy of spindly trees. It was easy to look at the pavement and imagine it was the sidewalk leading up to our house in Paris, lined with neat buildings and wrought iron balconies brimming over with colorful plants. The city would be full of black coats and quiet residents quietly hoping for the first rays of sun to allow them their short skirts, shorts, and shades.

The Empire State Building could be La Tour Eiffel. The stretch of green earth before me: the Champ de Mars. The tourists would brave the chill for a stereotypical picnic in the shadow of Paris's most famous lady, and I could feel superior in my Frenchness by turning up my nose at how ridiculous they looked and mocking them with my friends.

At least, that's what I _would_ have been doing, had I not been wandering through Central Park, a little lost, and without any companions to speak of, much less to.

When I saw Paris again, from my comfortable position in my own cushy seat aboard the Bass jet, I silently apologized for the way we had left things. After all, it had not slighted me; it had never turned its back on me, lied, cheated, used, or abused me. It had simply been.

I had adjusted so marvelously in Manhattan, grown used to the sights and smells and the ebb and flow of obnoxious traffic, become tolerant of the company of exuberant Americans (and I begrudgingly forgave them their continent-wide misunderstanding of the word 'civilized'); perhaps because I had been born there, because maman had always been a New York City darling and daddy owned practically the whole island, or possibly because it did remind me a little bit of home.

In that it was nothing like it, bien sûr.

Though it had never been my lifelong dream, many of my childhood friends had fantasized about living in New York. Some of them had never been, others had visited, but none of them had lived there as I had; and now that I had, I could not dream of living anywhere else, and anyone who _could_ was fooling themselves.

New York had invigorated me from the moment I saw it. It made me feel alive, vibrant, young, fast, all the things that Paris was not.

I had always loved the petit beauty of the city of lights, Le Mouelleux au Chocolat, complaining loudly to my friends over coffee, and rebuking slight errors in French as we watched the stars on bicycle rides through L'Ile Saint-Louis, where we ate our Berthillon and allowed ourselves to feel like those picnicking tourists beneath the starry sky. It was charming, in its way; crotchety in comparison to Manhattan.

I had read somewhere that Paris is every Parisian's wife. New York is their mistress. Parisians know how living with your wife gets old._New York, c'est vraiment super, y a une énegie__._

And I knew it was true.

Teddy and I were near Rue George Sand in the 16th arrondissement, where maman was undoubtedly taking her morning coffee and getting ready for a busy day. I was explaining to mon frère jumeau that the address made us "gros bourges". It was privately amusing to me that he was strolling alongside me in a Ralph Lauren shirt, his collar popped roguishly to stave off the cold, and that he had absolutely no idea what I was talking about. He would never survive à Paris for more than a brief holiday. He was too happily ignorant and...well, just that. Happy. It was very unfashionable of him.

I had never felt happy before uprooting myself to the States, at least not since my childhood in Lyon. Too much thinking, too much pondering, and not just over the identity of my father. I had always been a little too indulgent, even by my circle's decadent standards; ordering dessert after dinner when all my friends 'asserted' themselves with _le ____café gourmand__;_ too much red had led more than one person to question the stability of my sanity. What I was supposed to want was to be unnoticed, to wear la couleur de l'été in summer and shake my head exasperatedly at those who did not understand; to make "J' me suis acheté un petit pull noir, tout simple, super mignon" my motto the rest of the year.

But I had never done that.

Perhaps that is why it had been so easy for Sophie to so thoroughly usurp me. I was too unpredictable. After all, excess is vulgar. Everything in moderation.

So, when I returned that grey January morning, I wore a long black coat, black tights, and simple black flats. I was in mourning for the late _joie de vivre._

They say distance is a Parisian's best friend, and I had learned just how true that is, at least a little bit. For me. Distance had made me realize more than the fact that Teddy and I looked quite similar: I didn't belong à Paris either, not for anything longer than a brief holiday. I had become too happy. It was very unfashionable of me.

Not to say I did not scoff with disdain when we were passed by a woman wearing white socks. _M____a__uvais goût vestimentaire. _People who wear white socks are, naturellement, terrible people, and being out of the country for any length of time would never do anything to alter that incontrovertible truth. I knew I would always beune jeune fille de Paris, stoutly French and in love avec fromage no matter what anyone said et le vin no matter what the government said et fêtes à la maison no matter what Manhattan said. (Et en l'amour avec moi-même, évidement.)

Je suis français. I had been raised by le Parisien ultime. A woman who had been born on the shores of America, but bred to live in Paris. L'âme de la France.

Just as I had _not_ been made to live there, perhaps she had. But we were there to convince her of exactly the opposite: that Manhattan needed her.

That _we_ needed her.

And we were not going back empty-handed.

We turned right on Avenue Mozart onto my familiar street, et voilà, the red door that led home stood only meters away.

A tall blonde with well-disguised dark roots rounded the corner, carrying a black version of the Valentino studded tote I had slung over my arm for my last day at Janson. The rest of her ensemble was black like pitch, coal heels, ebony coat, charcoal tights, obsidian earrings, onyx accessories, an inky form-fitting dress. Black was most certainly Sophie Schumacher's color.

Our eyes met instantly, and I could feel her gaze sweeping up and down my form even through both our pairs of tinted sunglasses. Not to be caught flaunting the city's priceless social color, I was sure to keep my trench open to reveal the tan khaki color of my pleated skirt, the beige of the stripes that ran horizontal along the black material of my mostly-unbuttoned cardigan. I was just demure enough to topple her crown and regain recognition at my old Lycée and become queen before my year as a première student came to an end. I had once told Lux that I could have stayed in Paris and staged a spectacular coup, made Tristan Marchand eat his words and come crawling on his knees, but...

I finally, really, absolutely no longer wanted to. I had Manhattan. Sophie was fooling herself.

But if I was prepared for a battle the likes of which the right bank had never seen, I was very mistaken. She lowered her shades and stared at me, and I saw my old friend shimmering in the light of her very surprised eyes. Gone was the cold stone carving I had last seen on the steps at Janson, and there she was: the girl I had giggled with, thrown parties with, planned Les Grandes Ecoles with, gone on p'tits weekends with, criticized fellow Parisians alongside, taken along for a second opinion on shopping excursions.

I had tried not to think of her as that girl, especially not after the terrible things Tristan had almost done to me in her name. But I could not help but recall how quick I had been to judge her, how easy it had been for him to twist her words, events, life to suit his destructive needs; perhaps she really had been going through something, and her frequent absences had been necessary – and what had I done? Jumped on the hatred train just because she had won our wager, fair and square.

"Elle..." she finally said, eyes flitting back and forth between me and Teddy. "Que fais-tu ici?"

I tightened my hold around Teddy's arm and he squeezed back without, I assumed, really knowing why. "Je suis ici pour voir ma mère."

"Your accent is different," she observed en anglais, gripping the handle of her purse and pressing her lips together in a pink line. "It must be New York."

"Oui," I said, wary of her cordial demeanor. "It must be."

"I was just at Tristan's," Sophie blurted, seemingly unable to hold it in any longer. But it was not _gloating_ that colored her tone, nor did she seem particularly triumphant.

Beside me, Teddy's eyes narrowed as he remembered just how much he loathed the 'psychotic little shit' (as daddy called him) who had attacked me not once, but twice. I knew that, had Sophie and I chanced to meet on a New York street corner just hours before and found out he was residing in a building nearby, his fingers would have already been pressing the speed dial for daddy, then Nate, then – after they were done taking care of things – the police. That gave me comfort, as did the fact that Dorota was very near and undoubtedly very willing to tear him to shreds and beat him to a pulp with her cast iron cooking skillet.

And mère, ma mère had never liked him in the first place.

"Were you?" I did my best imitation of a casual voice, as much for her sake as for Teddy's, and smiled unfazed. "And how is he?"

Then, the triumphant gleam flickered at us in her irises. "Black and blue since his encounter with you. And a lot less smug about it now that I have ended things."

My eyebrows leapt to my hairline of their own accord. "You have? But I thought..."

"I never sent him after you," she assured me, anticipating my doubt with the foresight of someone who had been amply warned. "Je promets."

As hard as it should have been to believe her, I remembered the many webs of lives Tristan had spun in order to earn his immortality at Janson, and it was all too likely he had made up her vendetta. After all, where was the sense in enacting revenge against a girl who had already conceded by _leaving the country_? Exile was much more humiliating than sleeping with Tristan Marchand, anyway, but fortunately I had fallen in love with the turn my life had taken and would not trade Central Park for Roland Garros for all the box seats in the world. And Sophie had never been one to assert herself as a true queen, anyway; international grudges were more my territory.

"Je te crois."

"Je dois y aller." She did not sweep across the cement for a friendly hug, nor did she whip out her mobile phone and ask for my new number. But she did smile and wave and bid me _adieu._

"That was it?" Teddy was stunned, and I led him underneath the red awning of Toques Et Chefs – Degustation sur place, specialties etrangeres, cuisine Française, comestibles de luxe, vins fins. "No take down? You didn't even insult her hair."

I steered him to the counter so I could order myself something to nibble on. The sight of that familiar door, bright and vermillion against the stonework, all those colorful flowers bursting from behind wrought iron... it was all so much to take in, even though the trees seemed to be faring well, and the people on the street were imbued with some sort of non-hostile welcoming spirit. Maybe we had gotten off at the wrong airport and were not really in Paris after all, but some charming provinciaux ville that happened to look exactly like it...

"We do things a bit differently in France, mon chère. Buy me a croissant."

The two of us sat at a round table in spindly black chairs and sipped coffee. We both liked it strong, how it was meant to taste; bitter and full of caffeine. Instead of making me jittery, it calmed my nerves and put the strange run-in with Sophie out of my mind completely. As long as we could manage to cross the street without being hit by a mindless driver or worse, a mindless bicyclist, or running into anyone else we knew, it would be a straight shot to the front door. I would use the key I had not removed from my key chain and open the door, and spare Teddy a tearful attack from Dorota.

"Ellie?"

I knew I should have wrapped a scarf around my head and worn bigger sunglasses...

Dorota's eyes were as wide as the saucers on which she loved to serve her home brewed tea. The reality of our situation was slammed home right about when I stood up, trying to think of some pithy excuse for just way I was loitering around the corner from maman's home, when the roundness of her eyes became a distant second to just how close her jaw came to scraping the ground when she saw Teddy in the seat next to mine. The incident at that fateful luncheon with Nate and Tristan came to mind in that moment, the sound of porcelain breaking on the ground and the wine that spread in a steady stain that bled through antique cloth.

The grocery bags in Dorota's arms did not suffer the same fate as that fine china, thankfully, but I was tensed to spring forward and catch them should the Polish maid grow faint.

Her mouth closed, then opened, then closed again, and she finally just settled for gaping; her eyes darted between us both, questioning, and understanding, and elation.

"This is Teddy," I told her, and it sounded lame even to my ears. "Teddy Bass."

The vegetables went tumbling into the street, and that was all it took: Dorota gasped, and I was afraid she had really, actually become speechless.

"Is maman home?" I asked, mostly to elicit a verbal response from her shocked vocal cords.

Instead, she nodded, and fumbled in her pocket for the door key. "Follow me."

As soon as her back was turned, Teddy allowed his carefully constructed façade of disinterest to crumble into a portrait of absolute fresh terror. I bit my lip to withhold a chuckle when I read the signs in the shadows that fell across the hollows of his cheeks, because they screamed that he had thought Dorota might attack him with an enormous hug, and he just was not ready for that kind of commitment until he was finished his coffee.

"Just breathe," I whispered, taking his arm once again and steering him through the slow procession of cars and pedestrians that littered the street. "She will not attack unless provoked."

"Very funny," he muttered out of the corner of his mouth, and he raked his free hand through his hair so many times I thought I might need to warn him about early balding. "Shut up."

He was just nervous, and though I could not admit it out loud (for his sake, clairement), so was I. Ma mère and I had not parted on the best terms, if two full blown Waldorf meltdowns can even be called 'parting'. I had not said goodbye, had not told her I loved her, had not even offered to keep in touch with her while I gallivanted around a foreign city and tried to prove that she was not my mother. I hoped everything could be mended now that I had clawed and scraped and found the truth, because I was more than willing to say I was sorry and have her hold me again, like when I was une petite fille.

And she could apologize to Teddy and explain everything to both of us, and then she could hold him like she had never gotten to when he was un petit garçon.

Then, I hoped, with a swell in my chest as Dorota unlocked the door and led us into the entrance hall, we could all go _home_.

Everything was just as I had left it, but watching Teddy as his eyes roved across the furniture and all the décor, so perfectly arranged and beautifully displayed that Elsie de Wolfe might very well have put her hands to it from the afterlife, it was like seeing it for the first time. The white floors, every tile polished to a faultless shine by Dorota herself, the dramatic curtains that were almost always swept aside to offer a chocolate box view of the street.

The curving stairs that sloped gracefully and disappeared to the upper level stayed empty for minutes after Dorota ascended them, so Teddy and I doffed our outerwear and took the long pause as a cue to tiptoe into the sitting room, where my piano was still upright and dust-free, and the stain of Crémant de Bourgogne was barely visible on the soft Arabian rug I had given ma mère for her 36th birthday. I made sure not to let Teddy perch on the edge of the chaise lounge that I quite frankly could do an entire eon without setting eyes on again, and instead forced him to the piano bench so the two of us could pass the quiet minutes with some playful duets.

Only the ticking on the grandfather clock alerted us to the slow passage of time.

"Do you ever wonder what it would have been like if maman had never left?" I finally broke the tense silence and let my fingers off the keys. The chords played themselves out on the whisper of the hammer. "If her and papa had never divorced and we had grown up together?"

Teddy took up the case for Clair de Lune and played it as gently as he could, as if maman had not already been told we were in the house. Maybe he had dreamed of meeting her the same way I had dreamed of meeting daddy, and he had not intended for it to be in Paris on a foggy Sunday in January. Perhaps he had wanted it to be in a fine restaurant, with crystal chandeliers and white napkins draped across bone china, in the frame of a sunlit window. Of course, in those daydreams, she had always looked like Misty Bass, never Blair – maybe he had catered his wishes to suit his circumstances, as I had?

The deep chords were a little louder than the light ones, and I could not help but notice him frown as he answered me. "Of course I do."

"Do you think anything would be very different?"

I had given the matter a starring role in many of my nighttime lullabies, and was convinced that Teddy and I would merely have a greater knowledge of how to get on each others nerves, and that we would have to put up with public displays of affection from our still very-much-in-lust progenitors. But past weekend brunches at The Palace, holiday lunches at The Empire, and weekday dinners at The Pierre (and possibly less free reign over daddy's bank account), I could not picture anything else. Daddy with a smile on his face, maman glowing like the lit fuse of a Roman candle.

Teddy and I were still Teddy and I, only I had an impeccable American accent. That part, I did not like. I was quite fond of the exotic way my tongue wrapped around English words.

It was not so much that I sensed we had not missed anything, but that I knew we had. There were so many things Teddy and Chuck had experienced together, a history of traditions maman and I had forged over the years, and only a handful of things I could say I had done with my father, with my brother. And none of those things had included my mother. It was not right, for us not to be a family. Maman had to come downstairs, and we had to sort this out.

The footsteps that fell on the landing above could not have come a moment sooner.

"Merci, que Dieu..."

I stood up and brushed down my skirt so maman would not be displeased with the sight of wrinkled fabric. Teddy tugged at his bow tie, and I fussed over his hair.

He swatted me away and I pouted indignantly. He would be in grand trouble when mère saw his weedy tufts of hair sprouting all over the place. But that was no longer _my _problem.

I wondered if she had taken so long because she wanted to look perfect, and then I decided it was stupid to wonder that. Of _course_ she had taken so long because she wanted to look perfect, it was maman I was thinking about; her curls would need to be glossy, her makeup flawless, her complexion smooth and radiant, her ensemble structured and fashionably chic before she could alight the stairs and grace her children with her presence. And that was fine, because she was nervous too, I knew it – her son was waiting for her, and I knew from reading her intimate thoughts that she had been dreaming of him for 16 years, the same papa had been dreaming of me.

Their reunion would be much less dramatic, but no less important. I held my breath and waited for her to appear around the corner.

"It's about time you two got here."

I never saw Teddy's face when the realization dawned, because I was too busy trying to keep my eyelashes from beating so furiously against each other that they obscured my vision, and my vision _had_ to be cleared because there was absolutely no way I was seeing what my eyes were seeing. My neck would not turn, so I could not check to see if my twin's brow was equally as creased, his lips parted just slightly and on the verge of whispering a question they did not really require an answer for; I felt him tense, though, and from that I could deduce that we looked like an identical pair of thoroughly bewildered toddlers staring at a row of books. Toddler fish, because I, for one, was gaping just like one.

Toddler Dorotas, actually, because that's exactly what she had done upon seeing Teddy for the first time since he was an infant.

It was a day for gaping fish.

Daddy leaned casually against the chambranle, the barely concealed smirk on his face matched only by the amused glint in his black eyes.

Teddy managed something like "puh?" before more footsteps sounded on the tile and there she was all in one not-slow-motion-at-all instant, brown curls dripping over her shoulders. She was halfway through clipping an earring in her right earlobe, looking altogether rushed but no less meticulously coiffed. The clicking of her heels stopped when her eyes met mine, then Teddy's, and that smile bloomed as vibrant and sweet as Monsieur Monet's Les Coquelicots.

"Oh, Teddy. Ellie." Her eyes melted, the skin around them smooth alabaster. "You kept us waiting."


	40. An Interlude: God Always Watching

**Author's note:** Okay so, A: The last version of this chapter I posted was THE WRONG VERSION. I had a file labeled Ch40 and another labeled Chapter40, and apparently I'm not very good at checking to make sure that my files are in order. So, that was MY bad. This chapter is longer, obviously, a little bit more fleshed out, and ends in...an entirely different place. I apologize for getting the wires crossed, but this version is about 75% the same as the other one. Think of the rest as...bonus content? Or the director's cut. Whatever, point is, MY BAD.

If you read the wrong version, please take time to re-read this one – there are things interjected where before there was nothing, and the ending is extended.

B: As I said in the AN in the...wrong...chapter...this was originally supposed to be the final chapter before the epilogue, but I couldn't resist slipping in one last POV. Chapter 41 will be the last "chapter" chapter before the epilogue kicks in, and that I can promise.

Enjoy!

xoxo

**CHAPTER FORTY**  
_An Interlude: God Always Watching_

Dorota had been tempted once (many, many times for a variety of reasons ranging from tiny to enormous) to just sit Miss Elle down and tell her everything she knew.

Not _everything _in the broadest sense of the term, obviously, but _everything _in regards to that burning hole in poor Ellie's life that was the absence of her father. It had taken all sorts of quiet reserve and strength (and fretful hours of contemplation over a promise she had made to Miss Blair all those years ago in the frame of a chocolate box view of Fifth Avenue) to keep her lips sealed. She could have done it so easily: written a note and slipped it underneath the bedroom door, quit polishing the silver long enough to look across the room at that lonely little girl and say "Your father is Chuck Bass."

The one time she remembered most vividly was the occasion of Miss Elle's birthday in Nice, when her little charge had been perched on Mister Waldorf's lap, bobbing up and down in time with bouncing his knees, dressed in white on a hot summer's day and smiling brilliantly as Dorota cut slices from her Tiffany blue three-tiered vanilla cake with lemon French cream and fresh raspberries. Dorota had seen Miss Blair in the background, her dark hair pulled and pinned away from her face, large sunglasses hiding her eyes, a black dress sheathing her small frame and cutting a sharp figure against the opalescent sky.

The man tickling Ellie's ribs and instructing her to blow out the candles and make a wish was not the man it should have been. It should have been Mister Chuck, and Teddy should have been there too, grinning toothily and vying for the same attentions. Miss Blair should have been smiling, the warm honey tones in her eyes flickering through slits as she squinted unabashedly against the sun.

And Dorota had poured Ellie's raspberry tea and clutched the teapot firmly between her madly trembling fingers, determined to blurt it out right then. A little girl deserved her father.

But she had bit her tongue, kept the false peace locked in the back of her memory.

_Silver light filtered through sparkling panes, falling in neat squares across the tiny sleeping forms of infant twins, and Miss Blair's shoulders shook for only a few minutes. Then, she lifted her head high, tilting her chin up enough to elongate her pearly neck, and said, in a choked voice, that Dorota must never speak of what was about to happen._

And she never had, not even when she had heard Miss Blair's sobs through closed doors and observed her dabbing her eyes as she updated her private diary en route to France on Mister Chuck's company jet. Not even after that quiet night in Miss Blair's bedroom, coddling and feeding and changing the twins as their mother watched stoically from her seat in a moonbeam.

"_I don't know what I'm doing, Dorota," Miss Blair had whispered into her knees. "I have no idea what I'm doing, I only know that I have to do it."_

Dorota had eyed her, the lithe figure she had seen grow from a bristly young girl into a bristly young woman, who had aged more over the course of one year than her round cheeks and thick chestnut curls could ever betray. No one was guilty of any crime other than all-consuming love and passion, and in their desperation to never live without each other, Charles and Blair Bass had made it impossible for themselves to do just that.

It had all begun, of course, with the pregnancy neither of them had wanted. At least, that was how Miss Blair made believe in her celluloid fantasies. Dorota remembered very clearly that while Miss Blair had been wan and miserable at the positive result glaring up at her from numerous pregnancy tests, Mister Chuck's reaction had been markedly different. Though he was surprised when he sat down his briefcase by the front door and was all but accosted by his weeping girlfriend, he had taken the news relatively in stride.

Dorota, brewing tea in the kitchen, had watched through the slats that divided her from the living room as Mister Chuck loosened the knot in his tie, removed his shoes, combed his fingers through his perfectly styled hair, and had Miss Blair sit beside him and explain, calmly and rationally, and without apologizing or rationalizing about "taking care of it", what exactly had her so worked up.

The news that he was going to be a father cemented the change in him that all of his friends and family had observed and remarked upon, slowly remoulding and shaping him into a man. All of the pregnancy books said that a woman became a mother the moment she found out she was pregnant, but that it took the father until the first time he held his child in his arms to come around to the notion. In the case of Chuck and Blair, of course, it was entirely topsy turvy.

He became a father almost instantaneously, more conscientious than ever about Miss Blair's needs and wishes. Every night he brought her a single yellow rose from the street vendor near the Empire Hotel's front doors, and tucked it into her hair just before kissing her on the forehead and asking her how she was feeling. Because, even before the fateful afternoon that had changed everything, Mister Chuck had realized the burden of carrying a Bass baby was no light load.

Miss Blair had been a little on the hysterical side before the diagnosis, confiding to Dorota that she thought the best thing would be to get rid of the unborn child altogether. It did not fit into her perfect plan of what she dreamed her perfect life should be; the vision had altered dramatically since her teen years, naturally, but in essence she still wanted the same things: a handsome husband with loads of money to lord over everyone in a reserved and dignified manner, an exclusive wedding so wildly elegant that the society pages would lose their heads over the guest list, a long honeymoon abroad, and – two or three years down the line – children to carry on the family traditions, attend Ivy League universities, and repeat the whole process again for themselves.

But none of that before she finished Yale.

It had been tooth and nail for her to regain admittance to the prestigious university. After a year pounding the streets and haunting the student-dominated coffee shops in the Village, of feeling more like an uprooted resident of Manhattan than an actual student, after a year of rather good behavior as far as Miss Blair was concerned, her wildest imaginings came true when Yale accepted her to transfer in the fall of 2010. Mister Chuck purchased a residence in New Haven, in which she stayed by herself for optimum peaceful and quiet study hours during the weekdays; on weekends, Mister Chuck and his driver made the trip to Connecticut, and the soon-to-be Basses rarely stepped out the front door.

One night in October, their lives were set to change.

The unmade decision had haunted poor Miss Blair for weeks as she struggled with what to do, what to tell Mister Chuck, should she tell Mister Chuck, how she would explain to her mother, should she tell anyone – and then, she reasoned to Dorota that night with only the stars to see them, as if she had willed it into being, the deficiency had set in. Mister Chuck, ever the overachiever when it came to such private matters, had given her twins to contend with. Two lives to sleep heavily in her stomach as she tossed and turned for nights and wrestled with ghosts that plagued her from future memories.

The blood stains on Miss Blair's undergarments had been an omen from heaven and hell, and she had cried into Mister Chuck's arms all night; the only time she had come up to breathe had been to inhale a hot cup of homemade soup which Dorota herself had spooned between her parched lips, while Mister Chuck held back her hair and stroked away the beads of sweat that had pooled on the back of her neck. That she had wished her children dead, had made an appointment with a specialist to discuss the procedure that would grant her a one way ticket back to life as she had known and loved it, that because of a medical complication she might miscarry her unborn twins whether she decided it was the best thing to do or not – the guilt weighed heavier on her heart than even her fear of the unknown.

Even on her wedding day, when she had still been deceptively thin and in possession of a heavenly glow not uncommon of brides-to-be (not to mention freshly pregnant mothers) her smile had not quite reached the depths of her eyes. It was all a charade to her, a coup to please her mother and society and Mister Chuck in one fell swoop.

Mister Chuck had worried incessantly – over the conditions of her bed rest, her diet, her sleeping patterns, her cell phone usage... everything they could talk about together had turned into a muted argument, with Miss Blair winging desperately against her constraints and Mister Chuck holding in his ire at the thought of how her stress must affect the children. And, once the twins were born and Miss Blair could not bring herself to touch them for more than a few minutes at a time without dissolving into silent tears, Mister Chuck took the road much traveled (treading in his own well-worn footsteps) and drank himself into a numb stupor.

It wasn't until Miss Blair moved herself to the Waldorf penthouse on Fifth Avenue that Mister Chuck awakened and remembered who he was supposed to be.

Miss Blair had never awakened, not even after she signed their marriage away and fled the country.

Still she slumbered, a little older and nary the wiser, heartbroken, but ultimately unsurprised by Miss Elle's departure for a better life with a loving father.

Dorota did not want to say it out loud, for it was a terrible thing to say to a woman so imbedded with grief, but Miss Blair should have known better. Of course her own daughter would resist the life of shapeless shadows and unsolvable mysteries that Miss Blair had tried to build for her out of paper thin playing cards. The tighter she had clamped her grip around the tenuous thread that bound Miss Elle to France, and to her, the thinner and more brittle that thread had become until finally, it had snapped and sent Ellie hurtling to American, to Manhattan, to everything Miss Blair had always known would lure her away.

Like mother, like daughter.

"I only wanted her to stay," Miss Blair had whispered early one morning, cradling her pillow between her chest and her knees and staring unblinkingly out the window.

"I know," Dorota had answered her, unsolicited, as she collected the vestiges of the meager breakfast Miss Blair had managed to swallow. "But she needed to know, Miss Blair."

"I couldn't be the one to tell her." The catch in Miss Blair's voice was muffled, because she had buried her head in the down feathers. "I didn't want to lose her."

Dorota had a feeling it was going to be _one of those days_. One of those nights, possibly. Much like the night Miss Blair had choked out her plan to leave Manhattan and start over in the innocent, sprawling countryside of a foreign land. Miss Blair had been collecting the pieces that formed the perfect puzzle image of the cracked and cobbled together mockery of brilliance her life had become.

But she still had _those days_.

Those days when Lady Godiva was the best companion to a quiet and anguished reverie. Tea would be accepted in mid-afternoon, and a selection of light fruits and vegetables might serve as Miss Blair's dinner depending on how dizzy she felt when she emerged from her hot bath.

Dorota sighed to herself as she scrubbed needlessly at dish after dish of pristine china. If only she had said something that day in Nice, or one of the hundreds of thousands of times after that: when Miss Blair was out of town and Dorota had Miss Elle all to herself, she should have said everything point-blank, as Miss Elle said, with a side dish of extra truthfulness. She should not have pretended to be mysteriously deaf the one time little Ellie had come into the kitchen as she was peeling potatoes for dinner and whispered a desperate plea to know who her father might be.

There had been some whispered hope that Ellie would return by Christmas. Elle Waldorf in winter was such a pleasant sight to behold, it seemed a crime that the City of Lights no longer shone in those brown eyes, almost as dark as pitch, that there was no longer one bright spot of gold trimmed ivory white in an eddy of midnight. The sky seemed, if it was possible, more grey than ever; and when the rain fell, it hit the pavement in an almost halfhearted pitter patter – as if to cry through the window pane that it did not _want_ to be here, but for Miss Blair to properly mourn, she needed to wallow in an endless storm.

Dorota had hoped privately to herself, and in vain. Miss Elle was not going to come back, not until her mother pulled herself together and remembered who _she_ was supposed to be.

At least, that was what she had thought as early as that morning, when the only sounds were a ticking mantel clock, a steady rhythm that added order to the chaos that filtered in from the street, and the sounds she herself made as she scrubbed and fluffed and wiped and baked. It was a habit of hers to make strawberry paczki on Sunday, a tradition that went as far back as her own childhood in Poland. They were not as pretty and delicate as the sumptuous chocolate truffles, creamy fruit tarts, dainty biscuits, baked meringues, macaroons, and puff pastries she usually shelled out for Miss Blair's society teas, but they were far more appetizing on a serving dish, and Miss Elle could devour two of them without a spare thought.

Dorota looked at the plate of finished pastries and sighed heavily. They went into a container with the rest of the uneaten paczki at the back of the refrigerator.

The linens were tumbling in the washing machine, and it was just about time to collect Miss Blair's dry cleaning – she still had to drop some pieces off at Miss Blair's jeweler for repair, and she would have to hurry if she wanted to get to le marché before the Parisian housewives invaded and bruised all the good pickings. Dorota slipped her coat out of the front hall closet, but the buzzer rang before she could so much as do up a single button.

This was off-putting for the simple reason that no one came to see Miss Blair at her home unless they were implicitly invited – by paper only, as most of them had come to learn; any invitation extended at a social event was merely a fleeting nicety not to be observed. Any other visitors would, naturally, be ringing to see Miss Elle – but none of them would dream of doing so before noon, and every last one of them knew very well that she was no longer in residence. That left one explanation for why someone would be pressing the bell at such an hour, on a gloomy weekend, in a nice neighborhood.

Someone was very lost and had no idea upon whose territory they were encroaching. The best thing would be to usher them away before Miss Blair could snap out of her self-pity long enough to hear the irritating noise, because if she came down those stairs and saw some stranger lingering in her doorway, Dorota did not know if she could dispose of the body fast enough to eliminate Miss Blair as the primary suspect.

With a heavy, weary sigh, Dorota shouldered the potential responsibility, and moved forward to unlock the door.

The man she saw through the peephole, dapper as ever in a tailored Hugo Boss suit that hung on his body with the ease that came with high quality, was most certainly _not_ lost.

Dorota had not spoken to Miss Blair's ex-husband since she had abandoned her life in Manhattan to move across the Atlantic and help Miss Blair through her hard time. It had been a hard decision, because New York City had become just as much her home as it had always been Miss Blair's, but where Miss Blair went, Dorota went too.

She had seen him since then, though, almost every day.

No, not in the form of a man lurking across the street, pining away for the woman in the master bedroom.

She saw him every time she looked up and Ellie was standing there. She saw Mister Chuck and so did Miss Blair, and she saw Miss Blair, both of them distilled into one little girl. Little woman. She was harsh and rude and brusque and indifferent, and she took up with the wrong boys and made the wrong friends and sometimes wore too much makeup and stayed out too late (she thought no one knew that, but Monsieur Lucien Poirier was a very observant man albeit a little too informative), but she was also sad and lonely and searching for something and beautiful and sensitive and, when she was tired enough, sweet as chocolate right to her crème-filled center.

(And it might as well have been that little woman on the doorstep. It was remarkable: the real, live resemblance...)

Miss Blair had been afraid of losing her from the day she arrived on French soil, straight from New York City and bawling her brown eyes out for the warmth of her brother. Mister Chuck had left a message to let Dorota know that Mister Teddy was suffering the same separation anxiety and that it would probably be very hard for Miss Blair to endure those cries if she knew who they were for, so Dorota had explained the piercing screams away as a bad reaction to her new country environment in Lyon, and eventually the tears fell only for food, attention, changing... normal things.

But it was not normal for a twin to be separated from her other half. Dorota had watched Ellie shoot up from a sprig of a little girl, had seen her hair darken, her jaw sharpen, her lips grow plump. And each time she looked at Ellie and saw something new, she wondered what had happened to Mister Teddy that day – had he grown a quarter of a foot? Had he asked his father to teach him how to shave yet? And when Elle got her first kiss, did Teddy have a special someone? It was very hard, not knowing – what he looked like, what he was doing, who he was with.

(And likewise, it could have been _him, _that darling little boy, ringing the buzzer and waiting not-so-patiently to be invited inside...)

It had been hard for Miss Blair, too, of course. She knew that Ellie belonged with him, not her, and that it was wrong of her to keep Miss Elle sequestered away on the other side of the Atlantic. They had moved from Lyon to Marnes-la-Coquette because Miss Blair had hoped the change in scenery might make her forget, or ease the sting, but it had only made it more pronounced. Miss Elle changed into a young woman in that house, experienced her first period, had her first boyfriend over for dinner. Was Teddy dating girls in Manhattan? Had he grown into a young man?

But Miss Elle had been Miss Blair's last gift from Mister Chuck, a living reminder of the time they had spent together. Of course she did not want to return that precious package to its sender.

"Dorota, are you going to answer that or not?" Miss Blair's inquiry floated down the stairs ahead of Miss Blair herself, giving Dorota just enough time to banish the quiver in her spine.

"I was just on my way to get your dry cleaning, Miss Blair."

Dorota clutched the ticket in her fist and stayed rooted in the foyer, as her instinct warned her to. She was in the perfect spot, between the staircase and the front door, and she could throw herself in front of either should the emergency arise. Miss Blair was in _no_ condition to be ambushed in such an alarmingly blunt way, especially in the wake of her last phone call from Miss Serena, whose report on Miss Elle's situation under Mister Chuck's care had only led to an hour of silent contemplation – the main topic of anguish: Miss Blair's Inherited Failings as a Mother.

She would need to be gently prodded back up to her room, so that Dorota could interrogate Mister Chuck and find out just what he was doing here and why he thought he could barge in, uninvited. _ No one _came to see Miss Blair unless they were invi...ted...

Though she wore only a loose blouson baby doll with macrame trim under a smoke grey full-length silk robe, Miss Blair had insisted Dorota set her hair in the gently sloping curls she was well-known for, and it was clear even in the pale light of the front room that she had spent the remainder of her alone time painstakingly applying just enough makeup to make herself presentable while still managing, through years of clever and reverently-adhered-to moisturizing techniques, to sport le bare face with a mysteriously youthful and entirely natural glow.

"What are you waiting for?" Miss Blair demanded, her freshly painted fingernails coming to rest at the bottom of the railing. "My silk shirts to be pressed? Go, before they mix them up again."

Dorota nodded, wondering if perhaps she had imagined Chuck Bass – a product of too much reminiscing, to be sure. She would have to remember not to get so caught up in the future. Besides, what on earth would Mister Chuck and Miss Blair have to say to each other after almost seventeen years apart? All that time without a single word passed directly between them, with only buried photographs, second hand news, and a brown-eyed brunette teenager to serve as a reminder of the other's existence... They shared a past, but there was nothing the two of them could possibly have in common in 2028. Perhaps they would have to see each other sometime soon, for surely Teddy would want to meet his mother? But aside from that, things would carry on. Mister Chuck would convince Miss Elle to give her mother a chance, and they would reconcile, and it would be a broken family, but at least there would be no more _secrets_.

"Oh, and Dorota?"

Miss Blair called down to her from where she had stopped on the landing, and Dorota stuffed her fingers into her black gloves as she nodded, "Yes?"

"Be sure to send Chuck up to my room on your way out."

There was only one thing to do: pinch herself and wake up.

When that failed, Dorota did the only other thing she could do. And when she had managed to draw her lips into a straight line, she reached blindly forward and swung open the front door.

"Dorota," he drawled. "Good morning."

Then, without waiting for her to ask him in, Mister Chuck swept past her and glanced around for less than a moment before his eyes lit on the stairs.

In even less than less than a moment, he was out of sight, the backs of his shiny black shoes disappearing on fluffy white carpet, on his way to the second floor and Miss Blair's bedroom. It would be the first time either of them laid eyes on each other since...the day she had left him, once and for all, for Mister Harold's chateau in Southern France. Dorota had seen, out of her peripheral vision, Miss Blair turn on her heel and shut their bedroom door behind her.

They had parted ways in a bedroom. (In fact, they had done all manner of things in bedrooms that Dorota preferred not to think about. God was always watching them, and they would be punished appropriately.) It was only fitting that they would reunite in one.

There was dry cleaning to be picked up, fresh and ripening fruits and crisply sliced vegetables to select from carts, enough errands to run that Dorota could be occupied for the remainder of the day if she really needed to stay away from the house. She could stop by the supermarket for other necessities, stock up on some snacks for herself while all of the holiday goodies were still on display; some of Blair's shoes needed to be repaired, and the florist down the way had promised to keep her updated on their hydrangeas. There was a calligrapher's address in her handbag, and she was supposed to stop by and commission some handmade invitations to Miss Blair's annual tea with the American ambassador.

Not to mention all the appointments she needed to confirm with Miss Blair's hairdresser, the new massage therapist at Miss Blair's preferred spa, the dog groomer, the dog walker, the...

The decision was hardly a decision at all. Dorota shed her coat and hurried up the stairs as quickly as she could without sacrificing stealthiness. The door to Miss Blair's room had been left blessedly ajar, so it was only too easy to stand beside a pot of flowers and pretend to arrange the bouquet as she inclined her better ear to eavesdrop on their conversation, which she could just barely make out from the wrong side of white yew.

"...until she was out of the house. Now it isn't a surprise."

Miss Blair was perched on the edge of her bed, or at least it sounded that way. There was a rustling that sounded suspiciously like the Miss Blair's bedsheets moving around (a sound Dorota was well-acquainted with due to Miss Blair's tendency to wallow and contemplate her misery while lounging in bed), and then Mister Chuck's voice, raspy and low, had joined Miss Blair's – and if the mental picture Dorota had conjured in her head was anywhere close to the truth, the two of them were seated less than an inch apart.

"You mean Dorota didn't know I was coming?" There was a chuckle and a pause. "I think she's slipping."

Then whispers dominated the conversation for several moments, before more rustling, and then a breathy little giggle that was far too inelegant for Miss Blair to ever use in public.

Though it was often her place to say _curiosity killed the cat_, Dorota simply could not help herself. Mister Chuck and Miss Blair were on the same continent, in the same country, inside the same house, looking at each other from across the same dark bedroom! Their love affair, marriage, and whirlwind divorce had been the single most explosive occurrence to bombard New York society since Gloria Vanderbilt's career as an author. People in _Paris_ still sometimes grew wide eyed and slack jawed when they realized the perennial society hostess and famed bachelorette Blair Waldorf was the former Mme. Bass. The entire island of Manhattan had been flabbergasted at their swift and tidy divorce, and from what Dorota had gleaned from conversations between Mister Nate and Miss Jenny, the whole matter as a topic of conversation had been swept under the rug when Mister Chuck had all but disappeared from his usual social scene.

This was a convergence to rival the very formation of the Himalayas! Numerous people would have their servants commit murder in order to witness this event.

Dorota would never breathe a word of it, not ever, nor did she relish the same sweep of satisfaction a gossip maven or society matron would glean from it. Despite all her pessimism and doubtfulness, no one wanted Chuck Bass and Blair Waldorf to get back together more than she did. No one. Not even Mister Chuck or Miss Blair, no even the enterprising Ellie. Ellie had not been there from the beginning as she had, and Mister Chuck and Miss Blair were, more often than not, utterly and epically blind.

She would have to think of some way to get him to stay in France, and in Miss Blair's home instead of one of his dozens of luxury hotels. That way, she could push them together and reignite their spark with the aid of sheer proximity. But she needed to see exactly where they were as far as speaking, eye contact, general comfortableness, before she pursued any clear course of action.

That, and _only_ that was the reason she crept forward and pressed her right eye up to the sliver between jamb and door to peek at what was going on in that bedroom.

When she emerged from the front door 30 seconds later, her coat firmly buttoned and her fingers trembling within her toasty gloves, Dorota's face was more red than a beet.

_God always watching,_ she thought as she stared resolutely at a shopping list she had drawn up for herself. _But I definitely am not!_

But no matter how quickly she walked or how doggedly she strove to keep her mind on task, she could not seem to shake the image from her brain. When she stopped to pick up a copy of the _International Herald Tribune_ and saw Mister Chuck's face staring up at her above a special interest piece, she chalked it up to simple coincidence – he was an internationally famous businessman, naturally one would assume to see him the global edition of _The New York Times. _The only reason she considered it so remarkable was that she had seen him just that morning, that he was in Miss Blair's bedroom –

_Ave Maria,__ gratia plena, Dominus tecum. Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus. Sancta Maria, Mater Domini nostri, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc, et in hora mortis nostrae. __Domine Iesu, dimitte nobis debita nostra, salva nos ab igne inferiori, perduc in caelum omnes animas, praesertim eas, quae misericordiae tuae maxime indigent. __In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti.__ Amen._

O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of Hell: lead all souls to Heaven especially those who are most in need of your mercy.

_Those who are most in need of your mercy._ Dorota cast a dark glance over her shoulder, casting her ire in the direction she had come from. It was all Mister Chuck's fault and Miss Blair's fault, because if she did not care so very much for both of them (Miss Blair, especially) and for their happiness, and were she not so certain that their mutual well-being laid in each other, she never would have risked her sanity and renowned upstanding moral character due to her cursed nosiness!

Dorota wanted only the best for her Miss Blair. Wasting away all alone in her house in Paris was not _the best_. But couldn't they have shown even a tiny bit of restraint? Did they not need to sit down and _discuss things_ like grown adults? What about the children? Were Teddy and Elle fending for themselves in Manhattan, without either parent there to watch over them and care for them and make sure they were not getting into too much trouble, because if Teddy was anything like Miss Elle he could probably stir up enough trouble without her there to speed things along. How could Mister Chuck leave them all alone? Why couldn't he have called Miss Blair and demanded that she meet them in New York? That way, everyone could have been together and things really could have been sorted out _the proper way_!

The _proper_ way.

Dorota shuddered, but it had nothing to do with the chill.

Perhaps she would not be so disturbed if she could riddle out exactly what image she was supposed to be seeing in the big picture. Clearly Mister Chuck and Miss Blair had communicated before his arrival, and _clearly_ the communication had gone swimmingly, but that did not ease Dorota's thoughts. All through her errands, only one question plagued her mind, to the point where several cashiers and more than several fellow shoppers grew agitated by her tendency to stop mid-step and stare into space.

Ellie and Teddy. What were they doing? Did they know about this too?

If they did, where were they?

Between le marché and the supermarket, Dorota had the sudden epiphany that that day, that glorious _glorious_ le Jour de l'An, could be a new beginning in more ways than a flip of the calendar. And once that thought was in her head, once the tiny seed of hope she had planted in November and nursed throughout the long, dark winter began to sprout and bloom and blossom in her mind's eye, she could see the whole harmonious scene as if it were already laid out in front of her.

And the centerpiece of that whole harmonious scene was a hot and home made feast, the likes of which she could only prepare if she purchased the right ingredients!

When Dorota made her way back up Avenue Mozart, the street that did the most to make her feel like she was back on Fifth Avenue and delivering groceries from Dean & Deluca, she thought she saw a vision of Mister Chuck and Miss Blair as teenagers, seated at the caf_é_ tables outside Toques Et Chefs, their brown hair glossy even in the abysmal light. Their twin coffee cups sent steam swirling beneath their nostrils, lent a rosy tint to their pale cheeks. Then Miss Blair's brow narrowed as though she were trapped in the midst of a very serious thought, and Dorota realized that it was _not _Miss Blair at all.

The teenage girl who looked so very much like the woman for whom Dorota had served faithfully for so man years was...

"Ellie?"

Phantom sounds of clinking china and broken porcelain sounded all around the street corner when Mister Teddy – for who else could it possibly be? – looked up at her from beside his twin sister.

It was – they were – together and right across the street from – but she hadn't expected them to be there so _soon_ – Mister Chuck must have brought them, but – loitering outside?

"This is Teddy," Miss Elle said unnecessarily, and it was then that Dorota took into account her longer hair and softened accent. "Teddy Bass."

_Yes_, Dorota wanted to breathe. _Yes! I know!_ _I saw him when he was just a little newborn baby, held him and fed him and oh just _look_ at him!_

Teddy. And Ellie. Together. Right in front of her. _This_ sight was _truly_ a convergence to rival the very creation of the universe. Suddenly, it was 2011 and they were in Manhattan, and the two children before her were small enough to fit in the crooks of her elbows, and they were walking beside Central Park in the beaming light of a glaring hot summer sun. She barely registered when she dropped the grocery bags and lost all the vegetables she had so carefully selected from only the best carts at le marché_, _because it really was time. It really was le Jour de l'An.

"Is maman home?"

Dorota wanted, again, to shout ___YES!_ But, one thing gave her pause.

If she took the twins to the house, they would expect to speak to their parents promptly.

That meant she was going to have to brave the bedroom door and pray twice as hard to the Virgin Mary to protect her eyes from further corruption.

But if she could do that, if she could manage to get all four of them in the same room and use Miss Blair's best Baccarat to eavesdrop through the wall, then everything would work out. Even if she might have to request a personal day to visit a therapist for a thorough mind cleanse.

___God always watching__,_ she reminded herself as she fished through her coat's many pockets for the key_. ____It will all work out._

"Follow me."


	41. Soul Meets Body

**Author's note:** If you've waited it out this long, thank you. If you've been reading from chapter one, thank you. If you just found this story, thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

"_I do believe it's true that there are roads left in both of our shoes"_

**CHAPTER FORTY-ONE**  
_Soul Meets Body_

If maman was the cat, Manhattan was her crème.

I had heard her talk about New York City all my life, had wished her farewell when she left to visit saba et grandmamma or my godmother or any other number of her friends in the city, had seen images of it on television and in movies, knew stories from her childhood in Central Park, had heard tales of the shopping and the nightlife, the fast pace and the indescribable energy that seemed to flow around its many buildings to catch you off-guard at the most random moments. It was constant and ever-changing, sleepless and solid, fickle but steadfast. My own experience there had led me to believe that it was the place I was meant to call home, the place I had always been meant to live and thrive and grow, but it had never occurred to me that it had been her city first. I was so used to seeing her against the backdrop of Paris, chic and unsmiling, that it was difficult to imagine her actually _living_ in any other place.

But as soon as her foot met the pavement on the corner of 5th and East 61st, I realized immediately how wrong I had been to think of her as the consummate Parisian. My life was a black-and-white film in that moment, when she emerged from the back of daddy's limo, her left hand in his right, the glittering platinum band on her ring finger reflecting the cold light of the January sun.

It was a moment, much like the moment the four of us had shared in the house back at 36 Rue George Sand, that seemed like a home video from someone else's life.

"_Oh, Teddy. Ellie. You kept us waiting."_

_All I could really register was her heels clicking on the floor. Was that sound real? Had I only imagined it? Had she really said anything? Was it all one very realistic dream?_

"_The jet landed hours ago."_

_She was as lithely and succinctly admonishing as ever, as though I had only just slammed the door in her face and was returning later that day to apologize. But there was a certain...je ne sais quoi about the way her lips parted across her teeth as she brushed past Chuck and through the archway into the sitting room; their eyes locked for a only a fraction of a second, their sleeves whispered across each other by a hair's breadth, but it was enough to send my heart leaping into my throat._

_My father, my mother, my brother, and me: together, in one room._

Together.

_Once upon a time, there was a girl who had a mother and a father. The king and queen lived on either side of a vast ocean, but their love was divided by more than just sea, sky, or boat._

_First, their love was divided in two: the king raised le petit prince while the queen was gifted with la petite princesse. The children were raised apart, brought up in different homes by different people, taught nothing of their real past, and expected to live out the rest of their lives in blissful ignorance. All did not go according to plan, of course, but if you have journeyed this far, that is a fact you already know._

_Second, their love was divided in half: by the echoes of the past that sliced through their memories like a knife. These echoes were far-reaching and many-fingered, and above all, they were greedy. They hung over the present like a giant's dead body, history pressing down on fact and choking those who remembered it. And what made it worse was that it was not the king or queen's history, but the histories of their own families – storied and winding enough to fill several tapestries._

_Third, their love was divided between them: never fulfilled in the absence of affection. A whisper of faded touches, the whiff of a favorite scent on a foreign breeze, a glimpse of someone on a crowded street corner – but when they turn to seek out a familiar gaze, the dream is shattered. Phone calls never made, letters never sent, words never said, words said and forgotten and regretted. Words said and remembered. Promises made at the foot of a gilded throne; fears nourished in years of exile._

_A queen under a spell: a sleeping beauty. A shell of her former self, playing dress up far away from home, slumbering through life and cold to passion or her heartbeat._

_A king rode to her rescue and when she saw him in her doorway, the sleep was ended. The veil was lifted, slowly, and with the same care one might take with a bridal sheath._

_Their love was whole only when they were together, to sit at its hearthstone and nurse its flame with helpful prods from an iron poker._

_And when their love was whole, it was said the king and queen seemed to be on fire._

_To say it was overwhelming to be in their presence is a horrendous understatement and not a worthy description of what it actually felt like. What it actually felt like, I'm not sure there is a single word to sum it up, soit en anglais ou en français. Even if such an adjective existed, I would not have been able to summon it from my mind at that moment of knowing that if we wanted to, we could reach out touch each other, all at once if the need for a group hug so arose (though that was a highly unlikely scenario, I could always dream)._

_I felt complete, most of all, like the fragmented puzzle was finally a colorful picture. But my brow knitted, and my mouth continued to gape unattractively, my eyes darted back and forth between the two of them – Chuck and Blair, Blair and Chuck – trying to reconcile their faces and their breathing and their moving and their coexistence. Ma mère went to the bar behind Teddy and I, and again I saw only daddy. I blinked, and he grinned._

"_We expected the car service to pick you up and bring you straight here. Dorota was going to make lunch."_

_There was a sudden thunk from the other side of the wall, then I heard loud noises coming from the kitchen as Dorota over-exaggerated her retrieval of the pots and pans to assure all of us that she had most certainly not been eavesdropping. I silently wagered that as soon as whatever succulent treat she had deemed worthy of this reunion was simmering away on the stove top, she would resume her post with a crystal glass etching a circle around her ear._

_I wanted to say 'We decided to walk around a little' to explain our tardiness. But then, I thought, we weren't really tardy. How were we to know that they would be waiting for us? That daddy would be there waiting for us. Our getaway had been swift, private, incognito, brilliantly orchestrated – we had even left word with the Lifton maid to cover for us should daddy try to call the estate and inquire as to our whereabouts! We had covered our tracks. The unquestioning staff at home had even been fed our lie and asked to pack appropriate casual wear!_

_Teddy's thoughts seemed to be whistling along the same track as mine. Our eyes locked too, for a little more than a fraction of a second, and then we both looked to daddy with identically wide eyes and asked, "What are you doing here?"_

_Mère laughed, in tune with the clinking of glass on Baccarat. "Remember when they used to yawn at the same time? You thought it was adorable."_

"_I thought it was an impressive display of synchronization," daddy argued reminiscently. "You thought it was adorable."_

"_C'est le ton qui fait la musique." Maman waved a hand and poured daddy a highball of Scotch from one of the more aged, expensive (and more than a little dusty) decanters. At least that finally answered a personal, less life-altering mystery as to why she stocked so much whisky beneath the bar. "You were the one who always tried to record it."_

_Daddy crossed his arms over his chest, his dress shirt wrinkling around his elbows. "So you could watch the footage as many times as you could stand."_

"_So you could convert the video file on your computer and upload it to your PDA." Maman produced a bottle of sparkling San Pé and poured its contents into three small tumblers. "He always liked to bring it up as a topic of conversation with members of the board by marketing it as an actual skill, but he hated it when any of them would pull out pictures and talk about _their _children."_

"_Their children are boring." Daddy's meager defense was somehow made more formidable by his nonchalant drawl. "Mine aren't."_

"_Chuck filled Dorota in on your favorites for dinner, Teddy."_

_It had all been some albeit strange, almost staged play version of a normal conversation. But, when mère brought Teddy his fizzy water and their fingertips brushed beneath the handcrafted hexagonal cut, the scene came to a grinding halt. Maman went, at that mere touch, from an alabaster angel to a pale statue, her face frozen in that tell-tale expression that could only mean she had forgotten her next line; it was a dreadful moment of less-than-blissful ignorance, a kind of grappling emptiness that rang true in her wide brown eyes. I knew that look well, having seen it many times over the years at society functions when her escort expected the evening to end in a place she wasn't willing to go, when I had asked her who Chuck Bass was, when I had begged to know the identify of my father. The look was reflected in Teddy's own expression, doe eyes and all, and for a moment the resemblance was so painfully obvious that it sent a tremble through my heart._

_Daddy was suddenly at my shoulder, his right hand on my shoulder and his left resting comfortably on maman's lower back. I realized with a sudden jolt that some time between daddy's appearance and the long stretch of uninterrupted shock I had reached for Teddy's hand to take it in mine, that we were touching, he and I, daddy and I, daddy et maman, ma mère et mon __frère._

_I'll never tell anyone and I will have Teddy killed if he so much as mentions it, but I couldn't help it. I couldn't stop crying._

No matter how adept we were at pretending to be normal, the four of us could never really _be_ normal. Not just because of the complicated history, the tangled web of heartbreak, deceit, fear, every bad thing that had split us up and kept us apart for sixteen long years, not because we were Basses and therefore expected to live up to everything the name entailed, and not because we lived on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Because daddy was stubborn and possessive, self-destructive if left to his own devices, prone to drink too much and smoke too much and lose himself too much in the excess that came with wealth and privilege; because maman was a romantic underneath all the hardness, past the frigid mask of dispassion she had been hiding behind for years, because she loved too much and too fiercely and scared herself into believing things that were not true; because Teddy and I were only sixteen, only trying to figure out exactly who we were supposed to be, and up until a few short months before, we had been roughing it out with no father for me and no mother for him.

A small and private wedding ceremony at the chateau in Lyon was not enough to heal over all those years of separation, the ring on maman's finger did not mean that all was forgiven and we could fall into a storybook life where everything went smoothly and nothing could ever tear us apart again, the fact that I was legally Eleanor Misty Bass for the first time since I was an infant did not mean that I was an entirely different person. Though, the months in New York had definitely changed things for me, to put it lightly.

If I hadn't fled Paris on that private jet with my godfather, hadn't gone to live in the Archibald townhouse, hadn't enrolled in Constance with the trust fund money maman had never withdrawn from my account, hadn't met Teddy and gone to the debutante ball and been saved and swept away by my long lost father, maman would never have stopped living in her fantasy world and let daddy wake her up with true love's kiss. (Oui, I knew they had done much more than kiss, but they were my maman et daddy and the very thought of it was enough to make me feel a little queasy, and sex didn't exactly fit in with my fairytale analogy.) We never would have been reunited. If I had let her, ma mère would have kept silent forever, might have lived the rest of her life in solitude and withered away without daring to look at what was actually in her heart, face the mistakes she and daddy had made in their youth and realize that nothing was too broken to repair.

I had thought hearing the entire story would bring me some kind of completion, might string together every event of my life and bring meaning to my existence. All my months, years, of sleuthing and hypothesizing and daydreaming would add up to some epic revelation I had not considered. But, in the end, it was just the story of a scared twenty-year-old girl who had been so afraid of failure she had been ready to abandon everything and literally push everyone so far away, that any chance of letting them down would be eliminated in her absolute absence. Daddy had never given up on her, had sent me to her as a reminder that he was always with her, that he had the same faith in her that she had in him, that she didn't have to be alone, that she could be a better mother than hers had been.

And, when I took a step back and reflected on all those years, I had to admit that he had been right. She had always loved me unconditionally, despite her secrecy, given me everything I wanted and more than I needed. Beyond that, I was through analyzing, done looking at my life with a clinical eye and examining everything through a microscope. I didn't hate Dorota for avoiding my eye any time I wondered aloud about the state of my family, didn't despise my godfather for keeping his lips sealed or Aunt Jenny for being so adamant that I keep my nose out of my parents' business, or my godmother for being an unreliable jet setter with five thousand boyfriends and an unreachable cell phone. I knew they had only been trying to protect maman, had been trying to shield me from the truth of her past so that I wouldn't judge her too harshly.

They had underestimated me, though perhaps with good reason.

But I had done things I'd never before dreamed of doing, had shed my old skin and become something different, something stronger, something better. Maybe it was the fact that I had suffered crushing heartache and devastating humiliation, had dethroned an overconfident challenger and become the Queen of Constance Billard School for Girls, was looking forward to a bright future in luxury accommodations with my _twin brother_ and my father, Chuck Bass, and my mother, the newly rechristened Blair Waldorf Bass, but I understood her better than I ever had. We had sat beside each other on the Bass jet, hands clenched together, my head resting on her shoulder as we both stared out the window at the passing clouds, and I had looked up into her eyes and known with perfect clarity exactly what she was thinking.

Because I had been thinking it too.

_This_ was right.

Those were the words she had said to daddy at the altar. Maman had been radiant in a beautiful cream dress, and daddy had been, as ever, dashing and handsome in a classic tuxedo. Papère and grand-père had decorated the arch under the trees on the back lawn of the chateau with yellow roses, and Teddy and I had donned Yves Saint Laurent and Givenchy respectively to assume the roles of best man and maid of honor. Grandmamma had expressed some concern that things were moving much too quickly, that daddy and maman ought to bring Teddy and I back to the States and take some time to get reacquainted. Maman had laughed at that, a real laugh that pulled effortlessly at her ruby red lips and filled her face with such joy as I had never seen it bear, and daddy had looked silently amused next to her. It was as if they had never been apart.

Seriously, it was as if they had never been apart. I stayed in the guest room with Teddy our first night at the house because I was scared I might hear something I wasn't supposed to.

They were in love, and love didn't need to wait or be rational. Besides, as maman also said at the altar, they were Chuck and Blair, Blair and Chuck.

Their honeymoon was going to wait until Summer, after maman could settle back into life in Manhattan and they could ship Teddy and I to the Hamptons with grandmother Lily. We were going to spend the months in between redecorating our (our!) home according to everyone's tastes, or so went the tentative plan, making appearances at all the right functions as the Bass family, and finally being a family. Together.

And maybe we should have been together for sixteen years, maybe it _always_ should have been right. Maybe we should have had sixteen years worth of weekend brunches at The Palace, 192 months' worth of lunches at The Empire, 5840 days worth of dinners at The Pierre, Christmases with all four of us under the tree, all four of us tying on our skates at Wollman Rink, countless mornings of Teddy and I bickering over the breakfast when we were late for school, ignoring our dad's bored demands for us to shut up and let him enjoy his paper, endless groans at maman picking out outfits for us and then dragging us to stuffy society events. But the part of me that is still six years old, tugging on white ribbons and staring wide eyed at the incomprehensible script in an Italian leather bound journal, is actually rather glad that we didn't have that.

I never thought I would think that. I thought as soon as everything came together, I would spend months mourning and pining for the days we had lost. But all I felt when I looked over at daddy and Teddy was happiness, happiness that we could be together from then on. Happiness that none of us would ever take our family for granted the way we might have otherwise. Sure, it isn't conventional to run away to another country and hunt for clues about the identity of your father, or two travel abroad with your long lost twin brother to try and reunite your parents after almost two decades of self-imposed separation.

And no, it's not conventional to eat family dinner at the five-star restaurant in your father's opulent hotel with your Jewish step-grandfather, overbearing fashion designer grandmamma, infamous socialite Lily van der Woodsen Bass "Humphrey" and their entire extended family, including your heroic godfather Nate Archibald and sunny godmother Serena van der Woodsen, while reporters and paparazzi wait outside with cameras and microphones to find out the scoop on Blair Bass's return to New York City and your twin brother sends under-the-table text messages to his supermodel girlfriend...

But I'm Elle Bass (formerly Waldorf, formerly Bass). I've never been conventional. _We_ have never been conventional. Why start now and ruin all the fun?

_XOXO_

* * *

Good morning, Upper East Side. Gossip Girl here. Your one and only source into the scandalous lives of Manhattan's elite.

Don't know who I am? Good. You're not supposed to.

They say absence makes the heart grow fonder. And if that's true, Gossip Girl has raked up enough nostalgia points to earn top billing in her own international comeback tour. So, boys and girls, get your tickets ready, because the gates are about to be unlocked and the opening act is a doozy:

**SPOTTED! **Gossip Girl's favorite grown-up foursome dining at Bella Blu, a certain white knight minus one shiny golden bauble. Unless you count the globe-trotting blonde who never left his side, that is. And is** B** here to stay and _is_ she staying here with **C**, or is the Queen Mum only passing through on a diplomatic mission? Rumor has it that monogrammed luggage sporting the initials _BW_ was seen being loaded into the triplex suite of the Pierre Hotel. Do I even need to pose the hypothetical 'coincidence?' or can you just draw the obvious conclusion for yourselves?

But enough about the past. It's a new me, a new decade, and a new regime. Time for a **changing of the guard**, don't you think?

The French have invaded and they've done it in style. Constance Billard has a new queen: the long lost heiress to the Bass name, no less. While it's certainly nice to have a Waldorf holding court on the Met steps again, how long will** E **be able to keep her throne? Or, barring a civilized coup (and let's face it, since when has courtesy been a factor in the dethroning of any monarch?) her head?

Speaking of which, I'm fairly sure **Cherry Valence** has lost hers. What Gossip Girl _thought_ would be a forgettable holiday fling has bloomed unexpectedly into a full-fledged semester romance with her very own **Ponyboy Curtis**. An internationally beloved supermodel and a skinny little UES WASP? I suppose stranger things have happened, but I'm thinking pretty hard right now and nothing is coming to mind. The question _here_ is, how long will **T** be able to keep his heart...from being broken, that is.

Miss me?

Whether you did or not...

You know you love me.

XOXO Gossip Girl


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